pof_1_2007_d_dp_1444767

LivableMegacities

Molecular MedicineTechnology forthe Environment

What technology can do to improve urban quality of life

Solutions that can limit climatechange are already available Earlier Detection and More Effective Treatment of Diseases

www.siemens.com/pof

Pictures of the FutureThe Magazine for Research and Innovation | Spring 2007

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Pictures of the Future | Editorial

2 Pictures of the Future | Spring 2007 Pictures of the Future | Spring 2007 3

The generation pyramid is changingshape. Fewer children and increasing

numbers of old people are turning it upsidedown. The average life expectancy in indus-trialized countries today is approximately 80years — twice as high as it was just a centuryago. In 2050, there will be more people aged60 and older worldwide than children underthe age of 15. According to statistics com-piled by the United Nations, people over80 are the fastest-growing age group. Andtheir number is expected to double world-wide by 2015 and quadruple by 2050.

A long life is obviously something every-one would like to have. But longevity harborstremendous challenges for society at large.

Prof. Dr. Erich R. Reinhardt is a member

of the Managing Board of Siemens AG and

President and CEO of Siemens Medical Solutions.

takes into account the individual patient’spredispositions and health history, therebymaking treatment more efficient (p. 68).

The second engine of change in thehealthcare sector is information technology.By contributing to the smooth exchange ofdata between clinics, doctors’ offices, phar-macies and health maintenance organiza-tions, IT makes processes faster and moreefficient. In addition, it helps users to or-ganize the flood of data that is generatedby modern imaging processes and molecu-lar medicine.

After all, illnesses such as cancer and heartdisease are generated by the interaction ofmany genes and proteins. Knowledge data-

Cover: Even as established diagnosticimaging technologies are being com-bined, as in this remarkable CT/PETscan, new, molecular-based visualiza-tion systems are being developed thatwill enhance their capabilities. On thehorizon are biomarkers for cancers andarterial plaque — and a new world ofdiagnostic and therapeutic possibilities.

For example, average worldwide per capitahealthcare expenditures for people over 75years of age are five times higher than thosefor people aged 25 to 34. If we wish to keephealthcare costs affordable in spite of demo-graphic change, we need solutions that offerenhanced quality of care at lower cost. Thatapplies in particular to the rapidly increasingincidence of diseases such as cancer, cardio-vascular disease and Alzheimer’s disease.

Our goal must be to continue offeringpeople unlimited access to top-quality med-icine in the future — and I’m convinced thatthis will be possible if we lay the ground-work today. The key to success is patient-focused healthcare that is highly efficientand utilizes the most effective processesavailable. Molecular medicine and ultra-modern information technology will playkey roles in this process. The rapid growthrates of these markets — 10 percent annuallyfor medical IT and up to 14 percent for someof the core fields of molecular medicine —confirm that our healthcare systems are ina state of transition.

Developments in the field of molecularmedicine are extremely promising, as evi-denced in several articles in this issue ofPictures of the Future (pp. 48-75). Particu-larly through the combination of laboratorydiagnostics and molecular imaging, molecularmedicine offers tremendous potential fordiagnosing diseases at an earlier stage ofdevelopment. As a result, they can be treatedmore effectively and economically. Besides,molecular medicine opens up a broad newfield: a more personalized type of therapy that

bases and computer-supported analyticprocesses open up the possibility of identi-fying these connections and diagnosinggenetically determined health risks even be-fore such diseases break out, so that coun-termeasures can be taken early on (p. 70).

These new technologies will inauguratea change away from a reactive approach tomedicine that intervenes only when symp-toms appear, and toward a knowledge-basedpreventive kind of medicine in the future.Information technology will also help olderand chronically ill people to continue livingin their own homes with as much fulfillmentas possible, thanks to processes of self-diag-nosis, monitoring and telemedicine (p. 42).

Siemens has done a great deal in recentmonths to identify the crucial trends in allthese areas of healthcare. For example, inaddition to acquiring CTI in the field of mo-lecular imaging and biomarkers, it has alsoacquired DPC and Bayer Diagnostics in thearea of laboratory diagnostics. As a result,Siemens Medical Solutions has become thefirst company in the healthcare sector thatis capable of offering a comprehensive di-agnostics chain incorporating all of the keysolutions of in vitro and in vivo diagnosticsin connection with information technology.

With almost 7,000 researchers workingon the development of medical systemsaround the world, we are confident that wecan live up to our role as a trendsetter andgenerator of medical progress in the futureas well — for the good of our partners, cus-tomers and countless other people all overthe world.

A Long and Healthy Life

Pictures of the Future | Contents

Contents

Technology for the Environment

Molecular Medicine

LivableMegacities

Features

78 Scenario 2020 Talk of the Town

10 Trends Lights and Dreams

13 Interview: ExperiencingMegacities in New Ways

14 Facts and Forecasts What People Think of Cities

16 Brazil Supercity Solutions

18 Interview with Jaime LernerThe Former Mayor of Curitiba onBuses and Clean Water

20 Moscow and St. PetersburgTale of Two Cities

22 Chicago My Kind of Metropolis

25 Security Eyes on Everything

28 London Building a Better Life in the City

32 Noise Prevention The Color of Quiet

34 LightingLet there Be Light

38 Navigation SystemsPocket Navigator

41 E-GovernmentA Door that’s Always Open

42 TelemedicineHappy Fish — Healthy Patients

44 Household AppliancesHome Smart Home

48 Scenario 2020 Microscopic Miracles

51 Trends Dissecting the Disease Machine

54 In Vitro DiagnosticsThe Right Mix

57 In Vivo DiagnosticsNipping Deadly Diseases in the Bud

62 Molecular TherapyZeroing in on Cancer

65 Research Cooperation UHF-MRTFocusing on Single Cells

67 Research Cooperation DCE-MRIVisualizing Tumor Growth

68 Interview: Prof. Detlev GantenCombining Images and Lab Results

70 Knowledge-Based ITDigging out the Data

73 Facts and Forecasts Market of the Future

74 Interview: Prof. Ralph WeisslederTomorrow’s Treatments

178 Scenario 2020 The Power of Persuasion

181 Trends Our Vanishing Options

183 Facts and ForecastsThe Sources of Greenhouse Gases

184 Interview: Cutting EmissionsProf. Hans Joachim Schellnhuber

186 Energy Efficiency How Cities Can Save a Fortune

190 Building Systems Working Smart in China

191 Power GenerationZero-Emission Power Plants

194 Treasures in the Trash 196 Hybrid Future199 Green Transportation

Lowering Emissions102 Product Development

Going Greener104 Water Treatment

Solutions You Can Swallow

114 In Brief Book: How Innovations Are Born /Jack of All Trades / Heating withVegetable Oil / Safe Blood Dona-tions / Small Wonder

116 Siemens Venture Capital Healthy Investments

146 Research CooperationWatching Thoughts with fMRI

176 Emerging Technologies Tapping the Sun and Moon

106 Feedback / Preview

Pictures of the Future | In Brief


Small WonderOsram has developed a light-emitting diode

(LED) spotlight that achieves an output ofmore than 1,000 lumens for the first time. That’sbrighter than a 50-watt halogen lamp. Thepower consumption is also substantially lower.In other words, the device is suitable for a broadrange of general lighting applications. The OstarLighting LED can, for example, provide sufficientlight for a desk from a height of two meters,while its small size will also enable completelynew types of lamp design. The market launchof Ostar Lighting is scheduled for summer2007. To achieve a 1,000 lm output , expertsat Osram employed a sophisticated systemfor high chip-packing density, whereby theresearchers managed to integrate six high-per-formance light emitting diode chips into theunit’s small housing. Each chip has an area ofonly one square millimeter. Ostar Lighting alsoachieves extremely high efficiency, deliveringup to 75 lumens per watt, depending on theoperating current. � sw

Powerful illumination. Ostar Lighting

can be used for general applications.

Safe Blood Donations Siemens and several part-

ners have developed anRFID-based solution for thecomprehensive monitoring ofblood donations. The achieve-ment will make blood transfu-sions even safer in the future.For one thing, blood identifica-tion via radio chips will practi-cally eliminate the possibility ofmix-ups. The system is alsoequipped with a temperaturesensor that makes it possibleto consistently monitor thetemperatures a sample hasbeen exposed to. Blood oftenhas to be discarded because itstemperature is either insufficiently monitored — or not monitored at all — throughoutits processing. The RFID chips with temperature sensors are affixed to blood bags,whose temperature can be determined at any time using radio-based reading devices.The chips are tough enough to withstand extreme stresses, including a sterilization andpasteurization process when they are manufactured, and being subjected to centrifugalforce of up to 5,000 g while being processed. The system is expected to be ready foruse in 2008 following approval by regulatory authorities. � na

Jack of allTrades

Could it actually take 20 years foran innovation to develop from

an initial idea to a marketable prod-uct? How are innovations that revo-lutionize entire industries developed?And how do developers deal withinnovations that are promising, butalso threaten to make their compa-nies’ long-established products obso-lete? Is there a way to avoid the “notinvented here syndrome?” Can slow-moving evolutionary developmentsbe just as successful as ingeniousinnovation breakthroughs?

What makes innovators tick, andwhat drives them? How are they able to overcome a broad spectrumof challenges? What’s the secret oftheir success — bold visions, moti-vated teams, or having the freedomto apply their creativity? How im-portant are internal and external net-works and close ties with customers?

The answers are found in a newbook, Innovative Minds — A LookInside Siemens’ Idea Machine. It

takes readers behind the scenes at Siemens laboratories, highlighting the stories of 30 innovators from all of Siemens’ business areas and regions. These are peoplewho have developed some of the most successful innovations of recent years,ranging from piezo injector technology for automobiles to new computer tomo-graphs and magnetic resonance tomographs, from the halogen lamp to industrialautomation, and from the gas sensor for building technology to the gas turbine forpower generation.

Many management books describe the ideal way to generate innovations — byusing the right strategies, tools and processes, for example. But reality is almostalways more complicated, and the roads to innovation are more intricate thanmanagement theories indicate. Innovative Minds tells the true and exciting storiesof innovators and their innovations. It will inspire innovators to try out new things— and encourage companies to create environments that promote innovation, help-ing them attract today’s best minds. The book is a useful resource for all involved inthe complex processes that transform an initial idea into a successful product — forreaders working in R&D, marketing, production, sales, strategy and innovationmanagement units, or corporate organization and management departments.The book can be ordered from: http://www.siemens.com/innovation/book � ue

How Innovations Are Really Born

Easy to use. AySystem has a large display that can also

be programmed for use as an emergency call button.

It’s a mobile alarm system, fitness trainer,and monitor of persons in need of care, all

in a single product. The versatile AySystem pre-sented by Siemens this spring contains a mobilecommunications module and sensors that de-tect noise, temperature changes and movement.But that’s not all. The device can be equippedwith a camera and GPS unit. Users can also re-motely control AySystem via the Internet. Thealarm feature is suitable for use in cars, week-end homes, or with baby phones. The ownersimply sets threshold values for temperature ornoise. Should actual measurements deviatefrom the predefined range, the device will senda text message or initiate a call via the mobilecommunication network. The device’s motionsensor can be used to monitor persons whoare in need of care, whereby AySystem notifiesa specified caregiver if someone has fallen or isno longer able to move. And because AySystemis linked to the Internet, it can also be used totrack the movements of taxis, joggers or peopleon mountain bikes. The system will be offeredon the basis of a mobile communications con-tract or a prepaid card. � na

VegetableOil as FuelAvegetable oil stove specially designed for

developing countries is making the pre-paration of meals safer and more environmen-tally friendly. The portable stove is the first touse conventional — and renewable — vegeta-ble oil as a fuel. And, unlike setups that burnwood and other fossil fuels, it produces hardlyany pollutants. The device, which has beensuccessfully tested, costs about 30 euros,making it affordable for most people inemerging markets like the Philippines. There,production of the stoves is well under way,and tests in Tanzania and several other coun-tries will follow. More than one-third of theworld’s population currently cooks meals overopen fires. In emerging markets especially,people often use wood, exposing themselvesto dangers in the process. According to a studyby the World Health Organization (WHO), atleast 1.6 million people die of respiratory ail-ments associated with cooking each year.Cooking with wood involves inhaling largeamounts of pollutants and can cause fires andburns. The “Protos” stove, which was devel-oped by BSH Bosch und Siemens HausgeräteGmbH, works like a camping stove. The owneruses an air pump to generate pressure of up tothree bar in a tank filled with vegetable oil, atwhich point the oil flows through a channelinto a vaporizer tube at the burner. There, thecooking flame heats it up, whereupon itvaporizes and ultimately burns. In the develop-ment of the stove, BSH was supported througha public-private partnership involving theGerman Ministry for Economic Cooperationand Development, and the German Investmentand Development Company. � sw

Environmentally friendly and safe. The BSH vegetable

oil stove is well-suited for use in emerging markets.

RFID blood bag. Temperature sensors monitor processing.

Flames of innovation. The paths to market success

are as varied as the innovators themselves.

Pictures of the Future | In Brief


New Turbine CoatingUsing a mixture of exotic

metals, Dr. Werner Stamm ofSiemens Power Generation in Mül-heim an der Ruhr has substantiallyimproved gas turbine blades. Usinga ceramic coating, he improvedthe components’ combustiontemperature, efficiency and serv-ice life. Turbines fitted with theseblades use fuel more efficientlyand thus help to reduce carbondioxide emissions. In gas turbines,the hot combustion gas strikes theblades in an environment whosetemperatures are in excess of

1,000 degrees Celsius. In order to protect these blades, Stamm developed a protectivecoating that is much more stable than those previously used. Here, he used various metals,including rhenium, which is relatively unknown. The optimal mixture of the materials pro-duces a coating that not only provides protection against oxidation but also serves as anadhesive for layers of thermal insulation. Rhenium, with its extremely high melting pointof approximately 3,200 degrees Celsius, improves various properties, particularly the heatresistance.Stamm was one of 12 Siemens Inventors of the Year in 2006. He has been work-ing for the company for 15 years and has submitted 52 inventions. The thing he likes mostabout his work is that he can see the entire life cycle of his products — in this case fromthe basic material to the coatings and the blade itself — all at a glance. � na

Stamm with turbine blade. He has submitted 52 inventions.

Cardiac Catheter in 3DTo assist doctors in conducting

minimally invasive proce-dures, Frank Sauer, a researcher atSiemens Corporate Research inPrinceton, New Jersey, has devel-oped a system that provides themwith a view inside the body duringoperations. The new method notonly makes it easier for cardiolo-gists to conduct catheter proce-dures, in which a small instrumentis inserted into the body through avein; it also makes such proce-dures safer and easier to learn.Until now, physicians have had

only a very limited view during interventions, being unable to directly see the organs inquestion. The new procedure, however, gives doctors a general overview of the target or-gan, helping them to guide the catheter. By using images from CT or MR scanners, Sauercreates a 3D depiction of the patient. The system then uses built-in position sensors to dis-play the catheter in the image during the procedure, allowing the doctor to see the exactposition of the instrument’s tip at any time. Sauer and his team developed the new systemin cooperation with the Angiography, Fluoroscopy, and X-Ray Systems division of SiemensMedical Solutions and partner company Biosense Webster. And its potential is far from ex-hausted. Sauer plans to link the devices’ position indicators with images generated duringthe operation, enabling doctors to intervene immediately if any problems occur. � na

A look into the body. Fast and safe catheter interventions.

Pictures of the Future | Spring 2007 7

Healthy InvestmentExperts from Siemens Venture Capital (SVC) constantly search thestartup scene for technol-ogy trends and businessideas. By making targetedinvestments, Siemens isable to offer its customersstate-of-the-art solutions.

Identifying pioneering innovations is a littlelike hunting for truffles,” says Dr. Ralf Schnell,

head of Siemens Venture Capital. “You need ahighly developed startup scene in which newtechnologies thrive, and the skills to ferret outat an early stage new trends that can be suc-cessfully marketed.” For this, Schnell relies onthe venture capital experts on his team, whoare well aware of what’s going on at SiemensCorporate Technology, and also keep tabs onnew trends. The health care sector is particular-ly innovative; that’s why Schnell put together ateam that analyzes startup companies in thesector and regularly identifies technologies toadd to the Siemens R&D portfolio.

U-Systems is one such pick. The California-based startup has developed a method for im-proving mammography examinations throughthe use of ultrasound. Doctors usually conductpreventive breast cancer examinations usingX-rays. However, when thick breast tissue is in-volved, which roughly 40 percent of all womenhave, the resulting images display poor resolu-tion. Siemens Medical Solutions (Med) did infact examine possibilities for combining an X-raymachine with ultrasound, but the costs seemedprohibitively high.

“We got lucky when we found out aboutU-Systems in 2003,” says Dr. Andrew Jay, headof SVC’s Medical Solutions Fund in Boston. Thestartup’s X-ray-free ultrasound technique fit rightinto Siemens’ plans. The system images thebreast from the front, rather than from the sideas mammography does, which means it can alsobe used to examine small breasts. And the ultra-sound source used by U-Systems was actually asystem from Siemens. “So we were delightedwith the company’s approach right from thestart,” says Jay. The 3D ultrasound image (sono-

gram) can be compared directly with a conven-tional mammograph to improve the diagnosis.

At the time Siemens encountered U-Systems,it was unclear if the technology would functionproperly in everyday use. Based on experience,SVC’s experts are well aware that a lot can gowrong in the process of creating a marketableproduct. After U-Systems’ developers had solv-ed a few problems in 2006, the first functionalunit of the product called SomoVu was deliv-ered that fall. The devices have since provedthemselves in clinical applications, and manyhospitals have ordered additional units. They’vebeen so successful that SVC significantly boost-ed Siemens’ financial interest in U-Systems, andMed signed a worldwide distribution agreement.

“Our investments safeguard our access to themost advanced expertise from outside of Sie-mens — and that ultimately helps Siemens tomaintain its leading position in medical technol-ogy,” Schnell explains. SVC is now expandingits search for startups in the medical systemssector, where the pace of development haspicked up substantially in recent years, not leastdue to the IT revolution and advances in ge-netic and molecular engineering. This explainswhy experts at the venture capital companynow evaluate between 400 and 500 startups peryear worldwide. The Medical Solutions Fund fo-cuses on molecular imaging, in vitro diagnoses,and IT applications. Many startups actuallyapproach Siemens themselves. “They’d like tobecome partners in our global high-tech com-pany,” says Jay with a measure of pride.

One company that contacted Siemens wasCylex, a startup that developed a test that meas-ures the intensity of immune system reactionsprior to organ transplants. The test helps doc-tors better assess whether a transplanted organ

SVC’s activities aren’t limited to investments;establishing direct links with the technologyscene is just as important. “We help our col-leagues in the Siemens business areas to estab-lish personal contacts with leading experts, byproviding a suitable platform for dialogue,”Schnell says.

SVC organizes and conducts several special-ized Innovation Circles yearly, as well as aSiemens Venture Summit — all designed tobring together internal and external experts.These meetings are valuable for Jay and Schnellbecause they generate new ideas. But, “there’salways a certain risk involved. Not every ideaworks in practice, or maybe there’s no marketfor a given application,” says Schnell. “That’swhy you often need a kind of sixth sense whenchoosing investments.” � Harald Hassenmüller

Financing a Range of Innovations

In addition to carrying out its own research and development activities, Siemens funds external

innovations by investing in startup companies via SVC, and through organizations like the Siemens

Technology Accelerator (STA) and the Siemens Technology-To-Business Center (TTB). These provide

startups with capital and expertise, as well as access to Siemens’ global resources. In return, Siemens

benefits from the technologies developed by startups. STA and TTB assist companies as early at the

“seed phase,” while SVC is responsible for making investments during subsequent financing rounds.

SVC is also closely involved in the Siemens innovation strategy process. With an investment volume of

about 700 million euros spread out across more than 100 startup companies and 30 venture capital

funds (primarily in the U.S., Europe, and Israel), SVC is the world’s third most active corporate venture

capital investor. It focuses on young companies that have the potential to generate solid returns in

Siemens’ strategic application fields — energy and the environment, health systems, automation, and

industrial and public infrastructure. SVC’s involvement encompasses several phases: financial participa-

tion; support in the form of licensing, supply, and marketing agreements; possible acquisition of the

company in question; and assistance with selling the company or launching it on the stock market.

will be rejected. The test which can significantlyreduce treatment costs has already receivedclearance by the U.S. Food and Drug Adminis-tration. The current post-transplant procedureinvolves administering medications that sup-press defensive reactions. But excessive dosesof such medications can weaken the immunesystem and lead to further complications, includ-ing infection. Until now, there has been no wayto know in advance how the body will react to atransplant, resulting in medication doses that areeither too high or too low. Jay estimates annualexpenditure on transplant-related medicationscurrently totals between $15,000 and $20,000per patient. He thinks immune tests could cutthis figure by between 30 and 50 percent. Sie-mens is exploring the possibility of developingan automated version of the Cylex test.

Siemens is investing in California-based U-Systems.

The company uses a new ultrasound approach to 3D

breast imaging. X-rays are not involved, but results

can be compared with those from mammography.

13 How People Experience CitiesUrban planner Harald Mieg andenvironmental psychologist Christ-ian Hoffmann discuss how urbandwellers feel about quality of life.

14 What People Think of Cities According to a comprehensivestudy, despite numerous prob-lems, citizens and urban decision-makers are generally optimistic.

16 Supercity Solutions Whether it’s Moscow, São Paulo,London or Chicago — each citydeals with its problems in its ownspecial way. Pages 16, 20, 22, 28

25 Eyes on EverythingSafety is a major factor in a largecity’s reputation. That’s whythere’s a billion-dollar market for safety solutions.

32 The Color of QuietNoise affects the quality of life.That’s why technologies are beingdeveloped to make power plants,trains and cars quieter.

34 Let there Be LightLEDs will transform urban envi-ronments. They not only save energy but also offer innovative possibilities for illumination.

39 Pocket NavigatorIn the future, drivers and pedestri-ans will be able to find their wayaround cities more easily, thanksto technologies like digital graffiti.

Highlights

2020Municipal manager John Gardiner is an

expert on the efficiency of urban infra-

structures. In response to questions from a

student, he explains how the city they live

in has dramatically reduced its energy con-

sumption while also enhancing the quality

of life. His apartment, which is also an

example of efficiency, is equipped with

energy-saving appliances and a multimedia

display made of organic LEDs.

Livable Megacities | Scenario 2020


Jennifer, you’ll just have to stay for dinner,”says John Gardiner, looking over the edge of

his glass. “I’m expecting a couple of importantpeople who can contribute to our discussion onenvironmentally friendly urban planning.”“Thanks for the invitation,” replies JenniferMiles, a student of applied ecology who hadapproached John after he gave a presentationat an international conference on energy effi-ciency. She had asked him a few questions, andhe had spontaneously invited her to his apart-

It’s June 2020. Municipalmanager John Gardiner isexplaining to a visiting stu-dent how he has improvedthe quality of life in his urban neighborhood whilecutting energy consumptionin half.

Talk of the Townment — in order to continue their interestingscientific discussion. “You wanted to tell mehow you managed to more than halve energyconsumption,” Jennifer prompts. “Saving en-ergy is very important, but it’s not everything,”John replies. “A city shouldn’t sacrifice any of itscharm in the process. Its inhabitants have toenjoy living there.”

John walks over to the panorama window.“Some 800,000 people live in my neighbor-hood. For years now, it’s been the most popu-

Parking guidance system Building technology LEDs and OLEDs Power plant technology


Maybe it will be a salesman who moves toNew York, or perhaps a skilled tradesman

who settles in Mumbai — at some point thisyear, one individual moving to a city will tip thescale, and for the first time in history more peo-ple will be living in cities than in rural areas.The development is dramatic in scale. Twothirds of the planet’s population will be living incities by 2050. The biggest impact will be felt inmegacities, defined by the UN as cities withmore than ten million inhabitants. Growth inthese huge metropolitan areas presents ex-traordinary challenges in terms of energy andwater supplies, and traffic and transport sys-tems. An adequate infrastructure is often non-existent in emerging markets, while in estab-lished cities it’s frequently outdated.

Mercer Consulting publishes an annualranking of quality of life in cities, measured interms of tangible factors. While it may seemparadoxical, many low-ranked cities are experi-encing particularly dynamic growth. Mumbai,for example, was most recently ranked 150thof 215 cities. However, about 350 familiesmove there every day. According to the UN, thepopulation of the Nigerian capital Lagos(199th) is expected to increase to 20 million by2010 and reach 40 million by 2025.

“This phenomenon is easy to explain,” saysurban expert Prof. George Hazel, director of the

MRC McLean Hazel consulting firm based in Ed-inburgh, Scotland. “Ultimately, even thesecities offer much better development opportu-nities than the surrounding areas. People wholive in cities also gain access to services such asmedical care. In the countryside these servicesaren’t available or are too far away.” And citiesshine brightly — something that’s very appar-ent when you look at images taken by satel-lites. But they also have a magic attraction thatisn’t limited to the light they emit. That’s be-cause they’re places where dreams can cometrue. Shanghai overflows with optimism, Dubaiconveys the impression of unlimited, magicalgrowth, while New York and Tokyo are arche-typical of the urban legend.

Needed: Optimism and Good Governance.The Mercer study has a more sober view of allof this, which is a good thing given that thefirm acts as a consultant for companies thatsend employees abroad. As a result, Mercerrankings are based on an assessment and com-parison of factors such as health care, trafficand transport infrastructure, safety and cleanli-ness. The study is a view from the outside, ofcourse; on the inside, things are often per-ceived differently. “Contentment with one’s liv-ing conditions doesn’t depend directly on thephysical design of a city,” says urban psycholo-

gist Christian Hoffmann in an interview (p. 13).This is confirmed by a research project sup-ported by Siemens, which found that half ofthe people surveyed rated the quality of life intheir city as at least average (p. 14). The findingwas also valid for participants living in emerg-ing markets. Conducted by MRC McLean Hazeland the GlobeScan research institute, this studypolled 522 decision-makers in 25 of the world’slargest cities. The respondents were asked toindicate their most urgent problems and theirexpectations for the future. The study foundthat politicians, urban planners and others whoinfluence urban development are mostly opti-mistic about the future. “And they have to be,”says Hazel, “because you can’t overcome thechallenges of urban growth unless you have apositive attitude.”

The study also found that the trend in cityagencies around the world is moving awayfrom simply administering public services to-ward actively managing them. “This makes itpossible to improve the quality of life to thehighest possible level — even in big cities, withall their problems,” explains Hazel. Money isn’tusually the most pressing issue when it comesto making improvements, he says. The key is-sue is good governance and integrated long-term planning. This is the foundation of the ef-fective use of funds. It’s also important to get

Lighting up Buenos Aires. The 140-meter-wide

Avenida 9 de Julio in the Argentine capital is

considered to be the world’s widest street. It’s

an impressive display of the appeal of city life.

was not only to be the world’s most energy-efficient city — we also wanted to provide ourcitizens with the best possible quality of life.”

John leans back in his chair. “I’ve also madethat a top priority here in my apartment,” hesays. “Take the lighting, for example. You haveno idea how important lighting is for creating asense of well-being. That OLED light panel overthere is also my home movie theater. And theceiling has a luminescent screen where I canmake a romantic sunset appear every evening.You really must stay for dinner.”

“Um...could be difficult, but now that youmention lighting, were you able to save energythere too?” asks Jennifer, walking toward thewindow. “Yes,” says John. “Thanks to LEDs,which need less than a fifth of the electricityrequired by incandescent bulbs or halogenlamps. The price of these tiny light sources hasfallen significantly. They’re so economical andhave such long lifespans that today we’re eveninserting them into pedestrian pathways toensure safety. I’ve got a few of them here in thecolumns and the furniture...”

“Wow,” says Jennifer with a polite smile.“And what about road traffic? That was alwaysthe second biggest energy consumer, wasn’tit?” “Here we used a two-pronged strategy,” lec-tures John. “First, we used taxes and emissionscertificates to promote hybrid and electric cars.Then we expanded the public transportationsystem significantly. We also converted the en-tire fleet of city buses so that they could run onhybrid diesel engines — but that was just asymbolic measure. The buses and the subwaysystem accounted for only one percent of thecity’s total energy consumption.”

“And what was the second step?” asks Jen-nifer. “Efficient traffic management,” answersJohn. “Of course, passenger car traffic has de-creased considerably, thanks to our outstand-ing subway system and the tolls on city traffic,but lots of commuters and suppliers still comehere by car. But now we inform drivers aboutcongestion risks while they’re still on beltways.Automatic guidance systems then direct themthrough the city to parking garages.”

Jennifer’s cell phone rings, interruptingJohn’s enthusiastic lecture. “Hi, Mike,” Jennifergreets the caller and a smile lights up her face.“O.K., great, I’ll come down right away,” shesays and folds up her phone. “John, whatyou’ve just said is absolutely true. The auto-matic guidance system directed my boyfriendto a free parking space right in front of yourbuilding. I asked him to pick me up.” Sheshakes hands with John and puts her half-empty glass on the counter. “Thanks for thedrink and all the information. Bye!”

� Norbert Aschenbrenner

Livable Megacities | Scenario 2020

lar of the city’s 20 districts. And from up hereit’s clear why people like it so much.” Jennifernods. “Do you know where most energy wasbeing wasted ten years ago?” asks John. “Inpower plants?” Jennifer answers. “Back thenthey had much lower efficiency ratings, andlots of energy was lost in the form of heat.” “Al-most everyone gets that question wrong,” saysJohn, smiling. “A lot more energy was wastedin buildings due to poor insulation. People vir-tually threw fuel out the window. In thosedays, heating systems accounted for 80 per-cent of household energy consumption! Build-ings were old, smart building technologieswere practically nonexistent, there were hardlyany combined heat and power plants — andfuel cell technology wasn’t affordable.”

“And what did you do about it?” “Financialincentives,” John answers. “For one thing, car-bon dioxide emissions have been taxed for along time now. That initially brought some re-lief to the homeowners and property ownerswho had modernized their buildings early on.And we introduced stricter regulations for newbuildings. Then too, as a municipal managerI’ve strongly emphasized performance con-tracting.” “What’s that?” asks Jennifer. “We ap-pointed a team of energy savings detectives.They look at all energy users in private house-holds, businesses and public buildings, andmake recommendations on modernization,which they also implement. The biggest energyguzzlers were motors and ventilation and air-conditioning technology. Today we mostly useenergy-saving motors, and ventilation systemsnow have smart regulation systems. That cutsenergy consumption by more than half.” “Howdid you get industry on board? Didn’t it cost alot?” asks Jennifer. “That too is a misconcep-tion,” answers John. “Of course investmentsare necessary. But they’re usually balanced outquickly by the resulting savings. By the way,that’s ideal for local authorities, which usuallyhave tight budgets.”

“I can see a power plant in the distance,”says Jennifer. “In my courses I learned thatpower plants have become increasingly effi-cient over the last 30 years.” “That’s right,” saysJohn. “And thanks to the savings, we were ableto revise our requirements planning downwardand close down older power plants with highCO2 emission levels. When we needed newpower plants, we made sure there was a mix ofgeothermal energy, wind energy and conven-tional technology. We also ensured that oursuppliers installed the best technology avail-able. Efficiency wasn’t our only criterion for theturbines; we also had to fulfill strict noise regu-lations. Nowadays, people living near a gasturbine plant hardly notice anything. Our aim

10 Pictures of the Future | Spring 2007

| Trends

Megacities are like magnets. Although their infrastructures are often inadequate and their populationsface huge challenges,they are still regarded as the places wheredreams come true.

LightsandDreams

| Interview


What makes a city worth living in?Hoffmann: Satisfaction with one’s living situ-ation depends on a lot more than a city’s physi-cal design. Also very important are soft factorssuch as social cohesion — in other words, thedegree to which people are incorporated intopersonal networks. There are also objectivecriteria, of course, including noise levels, airpollution and crime, job opportunities, free-dom of movement and good public transport.

Why do cities with a poor quality of life,from an objective standpoint, often havethe most dynamic population growth?Mieg: People move to cities like Jakarta andLagos because they’re the most attractiveplaces in their countries. We may not find themappealing, but people go to them because theyenable them to take control of, and improve,their lives. There’s also a lot of psychologyinvolved. The myths associated with city lifeexert a very powerful attraction.

What influence does urban psychologyhave on urban planning?Mieg: There’s great potential here. Urbanpsychology examines the interfaces betweenpeople and their urban environment, address-ing issues like the user-friendliness of mobilityservices, for example. Experienced urbanplanners always use psychology — even if theydon’t refer to it as such. Urban psychology canbe applied in many areas: to help lower crime,improve communication between plannersand residents, and control traffic flows.

How can crime be reduced?Hoffmann: According to the “DefensibleSpace” concept, urban construction should becarried out in a manner that leads residents toidentify with their surroundings. Put simply,

you have to build in a way that prompts peopleto say: “This is my neighborhood and I’m goingto help take care of it.” Spaces should be openand visible, and no areas should become stig-matized due to cheap forms of construction.The less visible a building doorway is, for exam-ple, the more likely you’ll see a higher level ofcrime there.

What must an architect take into accountto ensure that residents feel comfortable?Mieg: The most important factor is the designof semi-private areas — those between publicplaces, such as streets and squares, and privatespaces. This could be the area in front of abuilding, or an inner courtyard — placeswhere people talk with their neighbors, whichis why they’re so vital for communication. Thedesign of apartment building lobbies, for ex-ample, has a major impact on whether peopletalk to each other or remain anonymous.

How should an apartment building lobbybe designed?Mieg: It must be visible and open, but accessto the apartments should be clearly separated.It should be bright and pleasant, with plantsaround. If possible, there should also be day-light streaming in from above. The lobby must be clean and orderly; it must be clearthat someone is caring for it. Otherwise, thesemi-private area becomes public space, whichincreases the risk of vandalism.

And what about public places?Mieg: Outdoor spaces will be used in accor-dance with their appearance. If a square is des-olate, people won’t treat it with respect — theywon’t feel responsible for it. Generally, peoplefeel responsible for their private spaces and tosome extent for semi-private areas.

Are the guidelines you’ve mentioned actually being used?Hoffmann: Yes. Take Helmholtzplatz in Berlin,close to where I live (www.kiez-lebendig.de).Seven years ago there were many vacant com-mercial buildings, houses in need of renova-tion and a lot of drug dealers. Residents got in-volved to make the square more open byhelping to build playgrounds and renovatinghouses and shops. Within five years the placebecame one of the city’s top locations, and itall started by asking local residents what couldbe done to make the square more attractive.

Mieg: Berlin’s many courtyards are another ex-ample. They used to be symbols of a poor qual-ity of life. You could hear construction crewshammering away at 6:00 a.m.; the courtyardssmelled bad. Today they’re beautiful, with smallplaygrounds for kids, cafes, interesting shopsand a delightful urban atmosphere — an exam-ple of an ideal semi-private area. And the SonyCenter, with its large public spaces that exudegrandeur, even elicits a new way to understanddemocracy — but in a manner conceived towelcome people, not to impress them.

What can technology accomplish here?Mieg: It can help to meet basic needs by sup-plying food, warmth and mobility. It can alsohave a more subtle impact in the form of light-ing, which not only creates a sense of securitybut also can make a city more attractive. Thetypical urban atmosphere was in fact createdwith the advent of electric light. New types oftraffic guidance systems are also greatly en-hancing the quality of urban life by helping visi-tors to circumvent traffic jams. In the future,pedestrians will even be guided by satellite, en-abling them to experience cities in a completelynew way. � Interview: Norbert Aschenbrenner

Experiencing Megacities In New WaysProf. Harald Mieg, 45, (left) is the director of the interdisciplinaryGeorg Simmel Center for Metropolitan Studies at Humboldt Univer-sity in Berlin. A geographer, Mieg is also a professor of Metropolitanand Innovation Studies whose work is focused on sustainable urbandevelopment and human interaction in megacities. PsychologistChristian Hoffmann, 38, specializes in the psychology of innovationand urban-environment relationships. Hoffmann is a co-publisher ofthe magazine Umweltpsychologie (Environmental Psychology).

range of expertise is harnessed and utilizedsynergistically. This is good for customers, whono longer have to deal with several differentpartners — while also receiving higher-qualityproducts and services. Dr. Willfried Wienholt,head of Urban Development at Siemens, is acontact partner for megacities. “I talk to mayorsand urban planners and try to advise them onstrategy,” says Wienholt. “The key is to developa joint and holistic point of view that includesthe interdependency between ecology and in-frastructure, for example. My goal is to open upnew perspectives and find innovative solu-tions.”

Requirements vary sharply from city to city,however. In emerging markets, for example,the most important initial aspect is meetingbasic needs like housing, food, water and en-ergy. Wienholt points out that Siemens offersexpertise in developing public infrastructures

help prevent congestion and make it easier formotorists to find parking spaces. Navigationsystems can even be used to help pedestriansfind their way through unfamiliar cities.Siemens has also developed a museum guidethat uses virtual markers and provides museumvisitors with information on exhibits via ahandheld computer (p. 38).

Bright Lights, Small Cameras. Security is ahigh priority in all big cities. Here, video cam-eras can do more than help police officers solvecrimes; they can also prevent crime from hap-pening in the first place. London is a pioneer inthis field (p. 28). Any reservations its citizensmight have had about cameras in public placeswere eliminated after the July 2005 terrorist at-tacks. Now, Siemens experts are working on al-gorithms that will enable image recordings tobe assessed automatically on the basis of un-

Livable Megacities | Trends

citizens involved and to give them responsibil-ity. Curitiba in Brazil is a good example. Yearsago, the city’s water reservoirs were filled withgarbage (p.18). To remedy the situation, cityauthorities paid fishermen to remove thegarbage. In addition to earning more money,the fishermen also benefited from the fact thatthe water became cleaner and was thus able tosupport more fish. For its part, the city bene-fited from a service that cost much less thanwould have been the case if a waste removalcompany had been hired for the job.

Modern information technology offers anelegant — and democratic — way to get citizensinvolved, which in turn boosts their quality oflife. E-government solutions, for example, enableresidents to file applications and tax returnsmore quickly and easily (p. 41). They also savemunicipal authorities money by making pro-cesses more transparent. Because most gov-


New York’s Central Park, extensive subway system and ultramodern subway control center provide leisure, reliable transportation and security for millions of people.

ernment officials today tend to focus only ontheir own areas of responsibility, even projectsbased on the best intentions often have a neg-ative effect in the end. Hazel tells the story of anew, modern hospital that was built just out-side his home town of Edinburgh. The idea wasto offer more efficient patient care at lowercost. But because public transport connectionsto the hospital were poor, almost all visitorsand staff had to drive and pay high parkingfees. “There was no holistic planning. The hos-pital externalized its costs but the result didn’timprove the overall quality of life for the city’scitizens,” says Hazel.

That’s why Hazel proposes an approach inwhich district managers have an overview of allthe relevant factors and cooperate closely withplanning experts from specific infrastructuresegments. Siemens has been working in a simi-lar way for several years, with interdisciplinaryteams implementing projects for facilities suchas airports, hospitals, hotels and stadiums. Theadvantage here is that the company’s complete

(Pictures of the Future, Fall 2006, pp. 6-41).“When people have enough to eat and are warmin the winter, they begin to seek to improvetheir social status and develop their potential,”says Wienholt. Consequently, the more devel-oped a city is, as a rule, the higher its citizens’expectations will be.

One factor that has a negative impact inevery city is noise, particularly from road traf-fic. Aircraft, industry and power plants alsocontribute to the problem, and noise levelssometimes get high enough to make peoplesick. Siemens uses several approaches to thediminution and elimination of noise (p. 32).Siemens Power Generation, for example, has ateam that works on reducing power plant noiselevels as efficiently as possible. Siemens engi-neers are also reducing the noise levels oftrains, while more and more vehicles are usingpiezo injectors, which help to make combus-tion not only more efficient but also quieter.

Road traffic can also be made more accept-able by using traffic information systems that

usual activity (p. 25). Studies have shown thatbetter visibility and lighting can also help pre-vent crime in public places — for example, atbuilding entrances and in parks.

Lighting plays a big role in improving thequality of life. Bright lights at work — in combi-nation with daylight — heighten employees’concentration, while warm lighting at homecreates a pleasant atmosphere. A leader inlighting technology, the Siemens subsidiaryOsram is also playing a part in a revolutionthat’s changing cities and much more (p. 34).The company is producing light-emittingdiodes for everything from pin-sized lamps tolarge plastic spotlights. The diodes are ex-tremely efficient, dramatically cut energy useand are very long-lasting. They also open upcompletely new possibilities for facade lightingand interior lighting systems. Given their at-tractive properties, light diodes will probablybe given the task of ensuring that the cities oftomorrow continue to shine brightly.


In a Siemens-sponsored research project, 522 decision-

makers from 25 of the world’s largest cities have for the

first time provided detailed information on today’s most

pressing urban problems, and the outlook for the future.

Conducted by GlobeScan, an independent research insti-

tute, the study surveyed representatives of politics, city ad-

ministrations, business, the media, and scientific institutes

in the fall of 2006. At the same time, the consulting firm

MRC McLean Hazel analyzed critical infrastructure sectors

in eight of the 25 megacities, focusing on transportation,

energy supply, water, health care, safety and security, and

new approaches for urban financing and administration.

The megacities were divided into three categories:

Emerging Cities such as Cairo, New Delhi and Lagos; Tran-

sitional Cities like Istanbul, Moscow and São Paulo; and

Mature Cities such as London, New York and Paris. Al-

though each city has its own unique problems that call for

specific solutions, there are common trends. For example,

most of those surveyed surprisingly expressed optimism

about the future, and two-thirds of the respondents — in

both Mature and Emerging Cities — believe their cities will

successfully manage the next five years.

Economic growth and job creation have the highest

priority for 81 percent of those interviewed, while the most

important infrastructure issue is transportation, which 27

percent of those surveyed described as the number one

factor for boosting their city’s competitiveness and appeal.

That’s because congested streets and roads make life diffi-

cult and also have a negative impact on the economy. The

Confederation of British Industry, for example, estimates

that traffic jams in the UK alone generate an annual cost

to the economy of $38 billion.

The next most important infrastructure issues are

safety and security (nine percent) and energy supply (six

percent). Water and water sanitation were mentioned by

only three percent of respondents as an important com-

petitive factor. This is surprising, given that the cost of

inadequate supplies of clean drinking water and a lack of

water treatment systems in developing countries amount

to an estimated $170 billion per year, according to the

World Health Organization (WHO). Moreover, the United

Nations Development Program reports that over one bil-

lion people live more than one kilometer away from the

nearest source of clean drinking water. Europe and the

U.S. aren’t immune to such problems, either; both need to

overhaul water infrastructure systems that are in some

cases a century old. Even in a highly developed city like

London, one third of the total water supply today is lost

due to leaky pipes — and the percentage is even higher in

Emerging Cities such as Dhaka (62 percent).

Mature Cities often have outdated infrastructure sys-

tems, while some types of infrastructure are not even

present in developing countries and emerging markets.

London’s subway system, for example, urgently needs to

be overhauled and expanded, while Karachi, Pakistan,

doesn’t even have a subway, which is why commuters can

often be seen riding on the roofs of buses. Meanwhile,

countries like India and China struggle with inadequate

electrical capacity, which frequently leads to blackouts.

Still, even the OECD countries need to invest approxi-

mately $4 trillion in power generation and transmission

between 2002 and 2030, according to the International

Energy Agency — and developing countries will need to

spend a whopping $5.2 trillion.

What People Think of Cities

Livable Megacities | Facts and Forecasts


Around one-third of those surveyed say needed invest-

ments are often not made due to a lack of funds and

proper planning. Another problem cited is inadequate co-

ordination among various city agencies. Many respondents

would like to see holistic urban management concepts im-

plemented, which has hardly been the case to date. And

environmentally friendly solutions are becoming a more

important field of investment worldwide. That’s because

cities, which occupy only 0.4 percent of the earth’s sur-

face, generate about 80 percent of all greenhouse gases.

The majority of those surveyed would therefore especially

like to see investment in public transport systems like

subways, street cars, and regional rail lines over the next

five to ten years. Over the next ten years, Istanbul plans to

expand its $1.6 billion budget for construction projects by

an additional $4.9 billion, for tram and subway projects.

The most serious environmental challenge at the

moment, according to those surveyed, is air pollution, fol-

lowed by traffic jams. Six of ten respondents believe that

the authorities in their cities are aware of the often sub-

stantial role that infrastructure decisions can play in envi-

ronmental protection. Given a choice between environ-

mental protection and economic growth, however,

authorities often opt for the latter, especially in developing

countries, where 55 percent of those surveyed say envi-

ronmental considerations should take a back seat to meas-

ures for expanding their cities’ economic capacities. Only

14 percent of respondents from Mature Cities agree with

them, however.

Regardless of the type of city they live in, around half of

those surveyed say energy supply should focus on renew-

able resources, and half favor continued use of fossil fuels.

Most Serious Economic

Challenges

20%

14%

14%

8%

7%

Unemployment

Cost of living

Economic development

Inadequate infrastructure

Financing

Most Serious Environmental

Challenges

26%

15%

14%

13%

9%

Air pollution

Transportation

General pollution

Water pollution

Solid waste

Most Serious Social Challenges

14%

11%

9%

7%

% of respondentsmentioning

7%

7%

7%

Poor living conditions

Gap between rich and poor

Poverty

Education

Population growth

Public safety

Unemployment

Most Serious Challenges

Facing Urban Infrastructures

Transportation

Emergingcities

Transitional cities

Maturecities

% of respondents mentioning

Inadequate / ineffi-cient infrastructure

Planning

Lack of funding

Environment /pollution

17

9

9

3

9

43 45

14

8

11

4

10

9

4

2

City’s Probability of Successfully ManagingShort-Term Future

71%

100%

66%

57%

55%

50%

42%

North America

Africa/Middle East

India/China

Europe

Latin America

Rest of Asia

67%Average

Most Important Infrastructures for Attracting Investment

27%

9%

6%

6%

6%

6%

6%

Transportation

Safety and security

Education

Communications

Energy supply

Leisure and culture

City management

5%Environment

4%Health care

3%Water

Predicted Approach of

Transport Experts

Mass transitinfrastructure

Individualmotorized

transporta-tion

71%29%

Predicted Approach of

Energy Experts

Renewabletechnologies

Fossil fuels

48%52%

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There is a clear trend toward environmentally friendly

resources such as wind and solar energy, but there’s still

much to be done in this regard. In the UK, for example,

only four percent of total energy is generated through re-

newable resources, while 95 percent of Moscow’s needs

are covered by gas, and India and China rely mostly on coal

(75 percent). The majority of experts surveyed approve of

water recycling. Beijing’s Bei Xiaohe water treatment plant,

for example, now provides drinking water for 400,000

people, with plans for its capacity to be doubled.

Urban authorities not only want to expand infrastruc-

ture, but also want to make it more efficient. In addition,

they seek to actively control demand — a policy that has

not been implemented to a sufficient degree in the past,

although examples from the transportation sector demon-

strate that demand management can be quite effective.

The introduction of London’s Congestion Charge in 2003,

for example, has led to a 26-percent reduction in traffic

jams and a 21-percent decline in inner-city traffic volume.

Megacity demographic trends indicate an increasingly

aging population and heightened demand for medical

services. According to a study by the WHO, 130,000 people

die in developing countries each year from the effects of

urban air pollution alone. Mumbai now spends 25 percent

of its budget on health care, yet only one in five of its citi-

zens receives proper medical attention. The main problems

here are a lack of hospitals and doctors and an inefficient

health care system. While investment is needed to create

additional capacity, the quality of health care must also be

improved and costs must come down. More preventive

examinations and new information technologies, such as

the electronic patient file, would be a good start here.

Safety and security are also keys to ensuring a good

quality of life. Additional security personnel, better capac-

ity for prosecution of crimes, and improved planning can

make a positive contribution here. Gangs were cited by 36

percent of respondents as the most serious problem in this

area, and this applies especially to those from developing

countries and emerging markets. Other dangers men-

tioned include terrorism and natural disasters. The general

trend is toward crime prevention, with respondents tend-

ing to agree on the importance of investing in new tech-

nologies such as surveillance cameras linked with intelli-

gent systems that automatically evaluate data.

Opinions differ on the topic of privatization. Most of

the respondents predict infrastructure facilities and services

will remain largely under the ownership and control of lo-

cal authorities. The majority of those surveyed are open to

the idea of public-private partnerships, though, with 70

percent of politicians and public officials favoring the use of

PPPs as a means of boosting infrastructure efficiency. In

fact, they even believe this is more important than simply

providing financing for infrastructure projects.

At the same time, even cities that have transferred the

provision of services to private companies try to maintain

as much control over them as possible. In general, the

study shows that today’s urban officials understand that in

the future their roles will change — from passive adminis-

trators to proactive managers of efficient services.� Sylvia Trage


are heavily subsidizing the system. If fares re-flected real costs, most people would nolonger be able to afford a ticket.”

That’s why São Paulo needs solutions thatcut costs and make public transportation moreefficient. An example is the innovative energydistribution systems with which Siemens hasequipped the subway depot and a section oftrack of the new Line 4 Subway. “Small trans-former stations that supply the trains withpower are located at regular intervals alongthe subway line,” explains Christiano Oliveirafrom Siemens Transportation Systems. “Wehave equipped some of these stations withcontrolled rectifiers, which prevent voltagelosses and save energy. This allows the dis-

tance between the transformer stations to beincreased by 15 percent. As a result, the sub-way operator can build fewer transformer sta-tions, which means huge savings.”

In addition to its contribution to the newLine 4 Subway, Siemens has also helped to im-prove São Paulo’s old commuter trains. The1960s-vintage vehicles have been renovated,and bolstered by ten completely new trainsets. Together, the renovated and new trainsnow offer a comfortable alternative to thecity’s never-ending traffic jams.

Energy Challenge. The prospects for SãoPaulo’s inhabitants would be dim indeed with-out the steel lifelines that supply the city with

energy. Around 1,000 kilometers of high-volt-age lines criss-cross the metropolis like a safetynet, keeping Brazil’s economic heart beating.One of the men responsible for the power sup-ply, José Sidnei Colombo Martini, CEO ofCTEEP, an energy distribution company, has hishands full avoiding a collapse. “São Paulo’s en-ergy demand is constantly increasing,” he says.“That’s why we frequently need to add newsubstations that can handle the additionalload.” But that’s more easily said than done ina city like São Paulo. “You simply have too littlespace for conventional systems,” say Martini.

But there’s a solution. It’s a new substationthat Siemens and its partner company Alusaare building in the Anhanguera district of the

Measuring almost 80 kilometers across, São Paulo

is South America’s largest city. Home to 19 million

people, the conurbation accounts for 16 percent of

Brazil’s gross domestic product.

São Paulo’s Water management (left) power infrastructure (center), and public transit systems (right) are strained by a population of 19 million people.

Supercity SolutionsSão Paulo is South America’s No. 1 metropolis. But the city’s size also with it tremendous challenges in terms of water supply, power supply and transportation. Siemens is providing solutions for virtually all of the city’s major infrastructures.

Ariane López has only been living in SãoPaulo for a year. However, the Siemens

employee’s chances of finding her waythrough the vast ocean of buildings aren’t anyworse than those of a veteran “Paulistano.”Without a good map of the city, almost every-one — including experienced taxi drivers —gets lost sooner or later. “It’s no wonder,” saysAntônio Arnaldo, former Secretary of Infra-structure of São Paulo’s municipal administra-tion. “São Paulo is the largest city in SouthAmerica and is up to 80 kilometers across.More than 19 million people live in the metro-politan area.” This vast melting pot of concreteand humanity is also the country’s economicpowerhouse — contributing about 16 percentof Brazil’s gross domestic product. More than33,000 industrial enterprises and nearly 2,000banks are established here. That makes thismegacity the most important financial andeconomic center in South America.

“Unfortunately, the challenges we have tocontend with here are also massive,” saysArnaldo. “Take our drainage system, for in-stance. After a heavy rainfall, there may be asmany as 500 flooded areas throughout thecity.” Flooding poses a constant threatthroughout the rainy Brazilian summers fromOctober to March.

On the other hand, local reservoirs are of-ten empty during the area’s dry winters. “In

São Paulo, we simply have too little water for apopulation of this size,” says Arnaldo. “And wealso suffer from serious leaks throughout thewater delivery infrastructure.”

Nevertheless, this sort of incident does notgo unnoticed for long at Sabesp, a partly state-run enterprise that is the world’s fourth-largestwater supply company. Here, a Siemens’ Powercontrol and monitoring system sounds analarm whenever a probable leak is detected.“The system has been in operation since late2006 and is the most modern in South Amer-ica,” says Hélio Luiz Castro, head of waterdistribution at Sabesp. “It constantly measurespressure in the pipes and monitors water con-sumption on a neighborhood by neighbor-hood basis throughout the city.”

Digital Water Manager. Castro points to amonitor displaying São Paulo’s entire watergrid. “On that screen, we can monitor all of themajor systems and data on a single user inter-face in real time, from the reservoirs all theway to the pumping stations. If we were tohave a major leak anywhere in the city, a warn-ing notice would automatically appear in thecorresponding location. For example, the sys-tem would notify us of an unusually high levelof water consumption in that area. Thanks tothis technology, we’re able to track down al-most any disruption and correct it much faster

Attractive Megacities | Brazil


than before,” Castro says. But Siemens tech-nology does more than just locate damage. Adigital water manager also collects data suchas outdoor temperatures, which can be usedto make water-consumption forecasts. “Thisenables us to adjust the activity of our pump-ing stations accordingly,” says Castro. “Thatsaves energy and reduces our operating costs.”In all, Sabesp pumps approximately 67 cubicmeters of potable water per second in Brazil’smegacity.

However, São Paulo isn’t just thirsty; it’salso incredibly mobile. According to the mu-nicipal administration, five million cars areregistered in this metropolis, and 500 moreare added each day — a traffic load that oftenproduces prodigious smog. In addition, thesubway system is still far too limited for a cityof this size. São Paulo’s four lines comprise amere 60 kilometers, compared to more than1,100 kilometers of track in New York City.

“In order to reduce automobile traffic andimprove the quality of life, we urgently neednew metro lines,” says municipal infrastruc-ture expert Arnaldo. “That is why we are work-ing on a new subway line, which is expected toenter service in 2008.”

However, the new line will not come closeto meeting São Paulo’s demand. Nevertheless,Arnaldo is certain that at present, additionalexpansion would be too costly. “Even now, we


Curitiba: Cutting Traffic by 30%

Compared to São Paulo, the city of Curitiba,

which has three million inhabitants and is situated

about 500 kilometers further south, is an almost

tranquil village — and an example of a city that’s in

tune with the environment. “At 96 percent, we

have the highest literacy rate of any city in Brazil,”

says Mayor Carlos Alberto Richa. “We also have the

lowest unemployment rate in the country, and

we’re number three in the number of graduating

university students.” The city also ranked as a high-

quality place to live on the UN’s Human Development Index. Richa’s predecessor, Jaime Lerner, planted

the seed for this success (see interview). About 30 years ago, Lerner started working to give Curitiba

an effective local transit system, countless green spaces and parks, and other upgrades. The result?

More than 50 square meters of green space per person — about six times more than Paris — and up

to 30 percent less traffic than before. Siemens was also involved in Curitiba’s development. It was the

first high-tech company to open an office in the city and has meanwhile forged close ties to local uni-

versities. Siemens now supports various cooperative research projects for software development and

produces most of its communications solutions for corporate clients in Curitiba. Siemens is also help-

ing to modernize the city — for example, by improving healthcare facilities. In 2006, Siemens supplied

two Magnetom Avanto MRI machines to the ADBI Diagnostic Center. The mayor hopes that innovation

will provide a bright future for this metropolis. “Our goal is to become a long-term high-tech hub,” says

Richa. “This is the best way to help our citizens maintain their high quality of life,” he says.

cluding Los Angeles. In order to prove that it’seasier to implement such a system than somepeople think, we even set up a small test linein New York City in 1992. At first people said,“The traffic department won’t let you do it.” Sowe went to the traffic department, and theytold us that the transport workers’ unionwouldn’t stand for it. So we went to the unionto explain our idea. They said that handicappedpeople would never accept it. We then met withthe handicapped people’s association — andfive days later our system was up and running.

What does it take to create a truly livablecity in the 21st century?Lerner: If you want to improve the quality oflife in cities in the future — and make urbanenvironments more humane — you have toaddress three issues: mobility, sustainabilityand social diversity. My experience has shownme that the future of urban mobility lies abovethe surface — if nothing else, because of costconsiderations. Consequently, the quality ofabove-ground systems must be improved. Asfar as sustainability is concerned, you can sub-stantially improve the quality of life in a city ifpeople drive less, live closer to their jobs andseparate their garbage for recycling purposes.If you want to make a city more humane, youneed to have a balanced mix of different in-come and age groups, races and religions.That’s because people will only feel responsi-ble for their city if they also feel that theythemselves are respected.

Do you drive or take the subway?Lerner: Actually, I walk — but only a couple ofmeters, because there’s a BRT bus stop right infront of my house.

� Interview by Florian Martini

creased by 15 percent per year since the newSiemens systems were introduced. “It’s crucialthat our patients also benefit from digitiza-tion,” says Kfouri. “Picture archiving and com-munications systems, for instance, enableboth faster and better treatment. When doc-

tors transfer their patients to a neighboringdepartment, they can now send radiographsto their colleagues with the click of a mouse.”

Word of the high quality of Hospital doCoração has spread and demand has grownaccordingly. Says Kfouri: “In response, we planto expand our clinic by about 12,000 squaremeters. But even that won’t be enough. As aresult, a completely new building complex isalso being planned.”

In order to improve the quality of life of itsresidents, São Paulo will also have to investmore. It has made a start by significantly in-creasing its budgets for education and health.

“But we also need creative technical solutions,”says Arnaldo. “For instance, we have around6,000 sets of traffic lights, most of which arenot synchronized. With intelligent traffic con-trol, we could accomplish a lot without spend-ing too much.”

Despite the challenges, Arnaldo is quiteoptimistic about the future. “In ten years, SãoPaulo will still be South America’s most impor-tant city. In the long run, though, we’ll remaincompetitive only if the most important part ofour city — our inhabitants — doesn’t get leftbehind.”

� Florian Martini


Attractive Megacities | Brazil | Interview

city. Thanks to gas-insulated switchgear (GIS)from Siemens, the new substation occupiesonly a fraction of the space required by con-ventional stations, since GIS encloses its cop-per lines like tubular capsules. These lines con-tain SF6, a special gas that prevents thepotential difference of roughly 400 kV fromcausing a flashover. As a result, the individualcurrent-carrying elements can be spaced veryclosely. “The Anhanguera substation is thelargest of its kind in Brazil and is key for SãoPaulo because it will primarily supply the city’sfinancial district with energy,” says Martini,who believes that the city could lay its equip-

What’s the key to improving the quality of life in cities?Lerner: The key is to simply start. That’s oftennot as easy as it sounds, because many peoplein city councils are afraid to risk change. In-stead, they have drawn-out discussions, post-pone necessary decisions, and are generallypessimistic about change. Such pessimism isoften a self-fulfilling prophecy, as the foot-dragging wastes time, and the cities’ problemscontinue to grow. I’ve been invited to a hugenumber of seminars over the past 30 years todiscuss these problems, but I’ve never been invited to talk about solutions. So, gettingstarted is half the battle, and innovationmeans tackling the issue of change.

What changes were essential in order totransform the third-world city of Curitibainto a livable urban environment?Lerner: Our situation was like that of manyother cities; for example, we didn’t havemoney for a subway. We therefore sat down tofigure out how to create an optimal mass tran-sit system that would be inexpensive, reliable

Buses and Clean WaterJaime Lerner, 69, was governor of the Brazilian state ofParaná from 1995 to 2002. Prior to that, he was the mayorof Curitiba for many years. During that period he trans-formed a third-world city into a livable metropolis. Lernerhas gained worldwide recognition for his innovative urbanplanning concepts and unconventional ideas. He has received numerous international awards, including theUnited Nations Environmental Award, and is also a member of the Clinton Global Initiative.

and, above all, fast. The solution was the “BusRapid Transit System” (BRT) we established,whereby buses travel in special lanes closed toall other traffic. Passengers enter the bus atstops via special boarding tubes that are at thesame height as the bus doors. Passengers payin the tubes, rather than on the bus. Today, the system pays for itself and transports twomillion people per day, with the buses travel-ing at approximately one-minute intervals. Ithas led to a traffic reduction of up to 30 per-cent in Curitiba, while investment by privatecompanies in our city has increased significantly.

Do you have any more examples?Lerner: During my term as governor ofParaná, the bays around Curitiba were be-coming more polluted and fish stocks weredeclining. Our response was to get fishermento “fish” for garbage, which we bought fromthem. Basically, the key thing here was to es-tablish a system of mutual co-responsibilitythat would create a win-win situation foreveryone. So when the weather isn’t good forfishing, garbage is fished out of the water, and

the more garbage is fished out, the cleaner thewater becomes. In turn, the cleaner the water,the more money the fishermen make.

How were you able to get around the bu-reaucracy and implement these changes?Lerner: The main factor here is speed.Changes must be implemented very rapidly —on the one hand, to sidestep the slow-movingbureaucracy, but also to ensure that there’s notime to doubt what you’re doing. To accom-plish this, you need to be stubborn. You alsohave to understand that democracy isn’t al-ways about consensus; there’s also conflict.Imagine, for example, that you’re playing a vio-lin at a concert and you notice that maybe afifth of the audience doesn’t like your playing.Well, I wouldn’t stop playing and try to reach aconsensus. You’ve got to play to the end. Youcan talk to the dissatisfied people later.

Could the Curitiba concept also be appliedto other cities, even much bigger ones?Lerner: Of course. We established our BRT in1974, and today 83 cities use our system — in-

ment and lines underground. “It would thenbe possible to use the space made available toimprove the quality of life, perhaps by plantingmore green spaces. And a city without over-head power lines is more people-friendly andattractive,” he adds.

The future arrived at the Hospital doCoração about ten years ago. The hospital,which is located in the heart of São Paulo, isSouth America’s most modern, and started us-ing Siemens medical technology in 1996.Since Siemens supplied the hospital’s radiol-ogy department with computer tomographs(CT), and the digital picture archiving and

communications system PACS, the hospitalhas been updating its technology withSiemens equipment.

The new devices include a 16-slice PET / CTscanner, the first of its kind in all of LatinAmerica. “Medical care is becoming increas-ingly expensive in Brazil, while the insurancecompanies are paying less and less,” says clinicCEO Dr. Antonio Carlos Kfouri. “At the sametime, doctors no longer have as much time asthey used to. As a result, we have to becomemore efficient and speed up processes.”

According to Kfouri, the number of com-puted tomography examinations alone has in-

Livable Megacities | Moscow and St. Petersburg


From his office on the 12th floor of themunicipal building, Aleksandr Ivanovich

Borisov looks down on the future of Moscow. Anew neighborhood is being built at top speedon a former industrial wasteland in the westernpart of the city. The future Moscow Interna-tional Business Center (MIBC) is expected tointroduce something new: Combining com-mercial properties, residential units and recre-ational facilities in a square kilometer, it will bethe first complex of its kind not only in Russiabut in all of eastern Europe.

Renowned architects have designed thebuildings of this “Manhattan on the Moskva.”For example, Sir Norman Foster designed theRossija Tower, which is set to be one of Eu-rope’s highest skyscrapers. “It will symbolize

cent annually. At that rate, power plant capac-ity, which is currently 15 gigawatts, will needto increase to 31 gigawatts by 2020, saysSergey Romanovski, who manages the city’senergy sector. “We already have less capacitythan we need,” he admits. In the cold winter of2005/2006, shortfalls in the electricity networkresulted in short-term interruptions of servicefor private customers.

Needed: Power Plants and Hospitals.Moscow urgently needs new power plants, andits outdated ones need to be modernized. Ofthe approximately 20 new construction pro-jects planned in the city’s energy program, 14will be privately funded. The Strogino urbanpower plant, which has two generator units,each with a capacity of 130 megawatts, hasbeen equipped with gas and steam turbinesfrom Siemens. Plans also call for an expansionof the distribution and high-voltage networks.

“Siemens technologies offer good solutions formany aspects of the energy sector,” saysMoscow’s energy expert Romanovski.

In addition to transport and energy, DeputyMayor Rosljak also sees tremendous challengesin the area of social services. “In our long-termdevelopment strategy, it is our duty to safe-guard quality of life, better living conditions,employment and access to free education andtraining for our citizens,” he says. That, headds, will make life in Moscow even more at-tractive. For Rosljak, it’s obvious that the pri-vate sector must play a key role as a partner inthese projects. With Siemens in mind, he citesmedical technology as one example.

The tremendous demand for medical tech-nology solutions and maintenance at hospitalsis confirmed by radiologist Valentin Sinitsynfrom the Cardiology Center at the state-sup-ported Lomonosov University. “Our close part-nership with Siemens dates back to 1991,” he

says. That was the year his institute ordered thefirst high-field magnetic resonance tomographin Russia, to be used for the early detection ofheart and circulatory disease and cancer. “Thisdevice quickly and efficiently delivers a largeamount of high-quality information for diag-noses,” Sinitsyn explains, adding that angiogra-phy devices are also very much in demand.

Fast Track to St. Petersburg. It takes rail trav-elers five and a half hours to get to St. Peters-burg from Moscow, a distance of 700 kilome-ters to the northwest. To make the trip morecomfortable, the Russian government has or-dered eight Velaro trains from Siemens. Thecompany will also be responsible for theirmaintenance for the next 30 years. The nextstep will be to plot a new, faster rail route. Afterthe project is completed, the trip is expected totake less than three hours on trains traveling250 kilometers per hour.

“St. Petersburg, which still claims a leadingrole as a cultural center, was also specificallyplanned as a commercial center,” explainsAleksandr Prokhorenko, the city official respon-sible for foreign contacts. But today, the city’sapproximately 4.5 million inhabitants wouldbenefit more from culture and commerce iftraffic weren’t such a problem. Nevertheless,relief is on the way in the shape of bypassroads, a tunnel under the Neva River, additionalbridges and subway routes, and a lightweightstreetcar system. Because St. Petersburg requiresincreasing amounts of energy, the Northwestpower plant, which uses turbines from Siemens,was built in 2001. A second generator unitfrom Siemens went into operation at the endof 2006.

“Piter,” as St. Petersburg’s inhabitants affec-tionately call their city, has always played a ma-jor role for Siemens, says Igor Vershikovsky,who heads the local Siemens office. This iswhere Carl von Siemens, the companyfounder’s brother, opened Siemens’ first office

trade. “Moscow is the locomotive of the nationaleconomy,” says Borisov.

In architectural terms, Moscow’s growth isprimarily upwards. Free space is at a premium,and many factories are being relocated to thecity’s outskirts. In the harsh light of reality,Moscow’s inhabitants and visitors alike realizehow crowded the city has become. “Moscowshares the typical problems of Europe’s largecities. Its inhabitants suffer particularly fromheavy traffic,” says Yuri Rosljak, Moscow’s FirstDeputy Mayor. “Improving the situation is a ba-sic priority.” That’s because a working infra-structure is essential for investors as well.

Over 3.2 million vehicles are currently regis-tered in Moscow, and 300,000 are added everyyear. “Nobody was prepared for this boom,”

taking shape on the Third Ring road around thecity. Siemens, which signed a protocol of coop-eration and partnership with Moscow’s munici-pal authorities in December 2006, is currentlyequipping the 34-kilometer-long urban free-way with a comprehensive traffic guidance sys-tem that reacts flexibly to changing situations.In the future, speed limits will be flexibly set bymeans of electronic traffic signs, lanes will beclosed off, and rules and recommendations willbe flexibly posted. The system includes a trafficcontrol computer, a video monitoring centerand a weather station, the requisite sensors fortraffic and weather data, cameras and a datatransmission system. The system is due to en-ter service in mid-2007.

Moscow’s municipal authorities have alsodecided to change their approach to parkingfacilities. Siemens has equipped an initial set ofparking spaces on Tverskaya Street with auto-matic parking meters, but that’s only the begin-ning. In a few years this technology will be ex-panded to cover 40,000 parking spaces. And anew parking garage management system withroom for 1,400 vehicles at Domodedovo Air-port enables drivers to pay by credit card as

Old and new high-rises characterize the frenetic boom-town that Moscow has become. St. Petersburg, on theother hand, is more relaxed and cultivates its historicimage. But Russia’s two biggest cities have much incommon: increasing traffic and overextended electricitynetworks. Municipal authorities are increasingly rely-ing on Siemens technologies to provide solutions.

Late in the day, many commuters cross the Moskva

River as they pass the parliament building on their

way out of the city center. Heavy traffic is one of the

Russian capital’s biggest headaches.

The Third Ring, a 34-kilometer-long urban freeway (left), will soon be equipped with a flexible traffic guidance system from Siemens. In the future, the high-speed

Velaro train (center and right) will cut total travel time between Moscow and St. Petersburg from five and a half hours to less than three hours.

Tale of Two Cities

Moscow’s Third Ring road will be equipped with aguidance system, sensors and electronic signs.

Rosljak admits. Despite the authorities’ effortsto mitigate the traffic problem, constant con-gestion and a rising number of traffic accidentsmake daily driving difficult. Drivers sometimesspend hours traveling even short distances,and during rush hours passenger cars’ averagespeed is only six kilometers an hour.

In Moscow there are only 4.5 kilometers ofroad per square kilometer — less than half ofthe figure for London. “What’s more, there’s notraffic guidance system that reacts to changingsituations,” explains Michael Abel from SiemensIntelligent Traffic Solutions. But a solution is

well as cash. The system even has an inte-grated license plate recognition function,which is a valuable tool in the struggle to pre-vent auto theft.

According to Yuri Rosljak, Moscow’s prob-lems have increased even further in recentyears, due to the fact that not only its inhabi-tants but Russians in general regard it as theirmost attractive city. For example, Moscow hasdeveloped a ravenous appetite for energy, withelectricity consumption growing by eight per-

Moscow as a global metropolis,” says Borisov,who is an adviser to Mayor Yuri Luzhkov andDirector General of the Moscow InternationalBusiness Association (MIBA).

Russia’s capital is vigorously claiming aplace in the front ranks of global megacities.Ardently courted by foreign investors, Moscowis today the headquarters of all of Russia’s lead-ing industrial companies and major credit insti-tutions. With a population of 10.5 million,Moscow attracts workers from all over thecountry by offering the highest salaries, and itdominates the country’s wholesale and retail


that continues unabated. Today, Chicago has2.8 million residents (nearly 10 million if themetropolitan area is included), making it thethird-largest city in the U.S. after New York andLos Angeles. Chicago’s O’Hare Airport is thesecond-biggest in the world, and the city’sSears Tower, which is 110 stories and 442 me-ters high, was for many years the world’s tallestbuilding until 1998, when it was surpassed bybuildings in the booming cities of Asia.

Still, Chicago need not have an inferioritycomplex, as its quality of life outside the lime-light offers key advantages. For example, hous-ing is affordable and specialized workers areavailable, as are attractive jobs. There are uni-versities of worldwide renown, cultural attrac-tions, parks and beaches. In fact, almost all ofthe lakefront of Lake Michigan is accessible tothe public. “In terms of its quality of life andwhat it has to offer, Chicago can stand up toany other major city,” says Rick Kogan, anaward-winning Chicago Tribune reporter.

Olympic Opportunity. Chicago is back in thefast lane, and the most visible signs of this arethe many construction sites that dot the city.New buildings are going up because more andmore people want to live here. Even New Yorkreal estate mogul Donald Trump says that in-vestments in Chicago pay off better than thosein his own home town, which is why he’s build-ing a new residential and mixed-use skyscraperdowntown. Chicago also has a good chance of

hosting the 2016 Summer Olympic Games. Theonly serious U.S. rival is L.A., which has alreadyhosted the games twice.

One factor that could help is Chicago’s repu-tation as one of the country’s safest cities —despite Al Capone’s gangster legacy from theprohibition era. According to Chicago PoliceSuperintendent Philip J. Cline, aggressive crime-fighting strategies and the innovative use ofnew technology have helped Chicago keepahead in the fight against crime. “Unlike thenational trend that shows a 2.5 percent in-crease in crime in 2005, Chicago saw a 2.4 per-cent decrease, according to recent FBI statis-tics,” says Cline.

Between 2002 and 2005 the number ofhomicides fell by 26 percent. The police use acombination of street presence and moderntechnology to combat problems such as theillicit drug trade. More than 225 police camerasare wirelessly linked to all 25 police stationsand the 911 emergency center. Siemens setup the pilot program for this comprehensivesecurity system. During this project Siemens in-stalled a network of more than 60 surveillancecameras. The network uses intelligent software(Pictures of the Future, Fall 2006, p. 86) thatcan differentiate between suspicious and rou-tine activities and then alert the authorities.

The company has also improved safety inmany commercial and residential buildings byinstalling sophisticated emergency commu-nication systems in accordance with a new fire

Between 1870 and 1900, Chicago was thefastest-growing city the world had ever

seen. During those years, the city’s populationincreased sixfold, from just under 300,000 tomore than 1.7 million. Its port and railroad sta-tions were the biggest transshipment hubs inthe U.S. Chicago’s big advantage over othercities was its location. Canals, lakes and riversconnected it with the Great Lakes, New York,the Mississippi River and the Gulf of Mexico.

Siemens established its first U.S. regionaloffice in Chicago during this booming era ofeconomic development. Today, Siemens em-ploys more than 3,000 people in the state ofIllinois, which is home to the U.S. headquartersof Siemens Building Technologies and, since itspurchase from Bayer, the global headquartersof Siemens Medical Solutions’ Molecular Diag-nostics division (p. 54).

“Chicago remains a key transshipment cen-ter, where the security of goods and workforcesafety traditionally enjoys a high priority,” saysDave Mangano, regional vice president for Sie-mens Building Technologies (SBT). “That’s whySiemens’ ties to the city have been growing foryears.” It’s no coincidence that Siemens’ busi-ness here focuses on areas that are crucial togrowth: building and industrial automation,security, telecommunications and power gen-eration.

The first telephone line connecting NewYork and Chicago was established in 1882,ushering in a rivalry between the two cities

Waterfront skyline. Chicago offers a high quality of

life. Apartments and office space are cheaper than in

other major U.S. cities. What’s more, the city itself is

one of the safest in the country.

Developing Materials and Software

The Russian Federation has a formidable research network consisting of renowned universities and

research institutes, which are concentrated within the administrative structure of the Moscow Acad-

emy of Science. Siemens has been working closely with Russian research teams for years. For example

it has been involved with Lomonosov University in Moscow in the area of nano-carbon-based materials

for use in the cathodes of advanced, next-generation X-ray systems. “Russia has an excellent reputa-

tion in the area of materials research,” says Dr. Martin Gitsels, who is responsible for Siemens’ coopera-

tion in the project. Gitsels heads the research center that was established by Corporate Technology

(CT) in Moscow and St. Petersburg in 2004. Another focus of CT’s research center is the development

of new concepts for turbine combustion chambers. Siemens also recently launched a joint research

project in the area of software and systems engineering with the International Institute for Advanced

Aerospace Technologies, which is based in St. Petersburg. The project focuses on methods of improv-

ing the quality of safety-relevant systems. “We usually initiate research projects on commission from

our customers at Siemens or from CT and take on the responsibility for the expenses involved,” says

Gitsels. For their part, the Russian partners in such projects contribute laboratory infrastructure and

expertise to the research work.

Siemens’ cooperation with environmentalprotection companies is also growing, saysSiemens office head Vershikovsky. One suchproject involves purifying the water flowingdown the Neva into the Baltic Sea. “Finland andthe Baltic countries practice environmentalprotection according to EU norms, so greaterdemands are now being placed on us,” he says.

St. Petersburg differs from Moscow prima-rily in terms of its well-preserved historic cen-ter. High-rises exist only in housing projects onthe outskirts, and even they are less than 25stories high. But that may change. A GazpromGroup subsidiary is planning a multipurposebusiness center, Gazprom City, to be locatedalong the Neva near the baroque Smolny Clois-ter. Initial plans for a 300-meter skyscraperhave triggered storms of protest from local in-habitants. All in all, if the project goes through,the city could wind up having more in commonwith Moscow than most people think.

� Thomas Veser

Livable Megacities | Moscow and St. Petersburg

in Russia in 1853. In 1991, Siemens launchedits first joint venture with local turbine manu-facturer LMZ.

Siemens is also a major sponsor of culturaland research activities here. For example, it’ssubsidizing the construction of an interactivetechnology museum for children and youths inthe Peter and Paul Fortress in the city center,and it grants ten scholarships annually to tal-ented students. St. Petersburg, whose city cen-ter and surrounding palaces and gardens fromczarist times is a UNESCO World Heritage Site,has always valued the protection of culturalmonuments. After the reconstruction of theKonstantinovsky Palace, which is now a confer-ence center, the Russian company Neviss-Kom-pleks provided the Palace’s energy supply andbuilding automation systems. “Siemens, whichsupplied the components, has a good reputa-tion here. That helped us a lot with this con-tract,” says Neviss-Kompleks General DirectorAleksandr Shvirikasov.


The Konstantinovsky Palace (left) and other cultural treasures make St. Petersburg a UNESCO World Heritage

Site. Equipped with Siemens turbines, the city’s Northwest power plant serves nearly five million people.

Chicago was once the commercial center of anaspiring U.S. But it laterfell behind Los Angelesand New York. Now, thecity is rapidly regaining itspast glory as a progressiveand dynamic city in theheart of America. The me-tropolis on Lake Michiganoffers a high quality of lifeand is one of the safestcities in the U.S.

My Kind of Metropolis

| Chicago

| Security


Protecting urban centers from intruders hasalways been of paramount importance. As

early as the Middle Ages, major trading centerswere going to great lengths to build battle-ments, including towers and fortification walls.Access to cities was controlled at checkpoints,and anyone approaching the most importantbuildings, for example a palace, was con-fronted by heavily armed guards.

Even though today’s cities are thousands oftimes larger than medieval settlements, thefundamental security problems of the past arestill with us today. The city gates of old have

been replaced by airports, rail stations andhighways, which are under stricter control thanever before. Following the attack on the WorldTrade Center in New York and the subsequentterrorist attacks in Madrid and London, majorcities in western industrialized countries in par-ticular have been going to great lengths toadapt their security concepts to the new chal-lenges that have emerged as a result of theseevents. Experts estimate that the market forsecurity systems to protect cities, events andtransportation infrastructures will grow to anannual volume of approximately $106 billion

by 2010. London, for example, is a pioneer inmonitoring public spaces. The city has installedroughly 500,000 video cameras. Most London-ers don’t object to being watched on an every-day basis. After the July 2005 attacks, analysisof videos recorded by transit system camerasquickly put the authorities on the terrorists’trail. Within hours of the bombings, Siemensprovided the city with a team of experts andassociated specialized equipment. Plans call fora greater emphasis in the future on using mon-itoring systems in a manner that could preventattacks and disasters.

A city’s reputation depends largely on whether residents and visitors feel safe.Siemens offers solutions that range from intelligent video surveillance of publicspaces and subway system to worldwide container tracking for major ports.

Surveillance systems are an essential part of

today’s security mix. Siemens’ VistaScape platform

is ideal for combing and interpreting data from mul-

tiple sources at airports and other major facilities.

Eyes on Everything

cially since buildings use some 40 percent of allthe energy consumed each year in the U.S.

Chicago Mayor Richard Daley plans to drasti-cally reduce energy consumption in the city’sschools. To this end, Siemens has provided anatural gas and electricity-use monitoring sys-tem that compares energy use data with billingdata to spot errors. Even small discrepancies canadd up to millions of dollars. But even more im-portant is the evaluation of significant differ-ences between schools. Plans call for thoseschools that conserve energy to be rewarded.Some schools in Chicago’s suburbs are alreadyahead of the game. For example, in addition toinstalling a state-of-the-art climate and lightcontrol system in a school in the suburb of Glen-brook, Siemens has insulated the windows anddoors. The result: annual savings of $400,000.Many other school districts have signed energy-savings contracts with Siemens, whereby thecompany guarantees a certain level of savingsfrom which the investment can be paid off.

Siemens also installed energy-saving tech-nologies during the renovation and expansionof the NFL’s Chicago Bears stadium. A big prob-lem in the stadium, which holds 61,500 spec-tators, was how to effectively manage temper-ature control in interior spaces, which can heatup very quickly when thousands of peopleshow up at once to grab a snack or use the rest-rooms. The high-performance cooling systemfrom Siemens reacts rapidly, and can ensurethat things stay cool in the summer months.Siemens also equipped the stadium with a firedetection and alarm system that is integratedwith sprinklers to prevent fires or put them outearly on.

This year the Bears had a chance to win theSuper Bowl for the first time in 21 years, but lostto the Indianapolis Colts before a television au-dience of 93.2 million. But ever tough and re-silient, Chicago remains optimistic — thanks inno small measure to safety and security systemsfrom a company that’s called the city home forover one hundred years. � Harald Weiss

Livable Megacities | Chicago

ordinance. This was passed by the city in thefall of 2004 in the wake of a tragic fire thattook the lives of six city workers. The systemenables residents trapped in a fire to directlycontact the fire department and provide it withinformation that will aid the rescue operation.

Chicago’s role as a center of shipping andcommerce made it a hub for U.S. railroad com-panies. One rail line still in operation is theSouth Shore Line, which was built in 1908 andis now used by commuters and day tripperswho want to enjoy wonderful views of the lake.Siemens was recently commissioned to equipall of the line’s rail cars and its 25 stations withInternet Protocol (IP)-based digital video cam-eras. The state-of-the-art IP system provides areliable surveillance infrastructure platform thatcan be expanded quickly and economically.

Chicago’s significance as a transit hub isalso in evidence at O’Hare Airport. The facility,which was completed in 1943, handles almost


“The problem with comprehensive video moni-toring is that you need to analyze it in realtime. That’s because no one can constantlydigest what’s happening on dozens of monitor-ing screens,” says Pete Vitone, head of SecuritySystem Sales at SBT in Chicago. The softwareautomatically generates a bird’s-eye view ofthe entire area from the camera images. If asuspicious activity is registered, the system im-mediately notifies the security personnel andactivates the zooming feature on the cameras.

Safe Hotels. You’ll also find Siemens securitysolutions at the top of the Sears Tower. These in-clude the fire detection and alarm system andthe security systems for the transmitters on theroof. In the Grand Hilton Chicago — which with1,544 rooms is the city’s largest hotel — andother Hilton hotels, Siemens fire detection andalarm systems provide optimal protection. “If allof Chicago’s hotels installed such systems, hotel

Siemens equipped Chicago’s South Shore Linewith state-of-the-art IP surveillance cameras.

Surveillance systems keep an eye on Chicago’s harbor facilities 24/7. Siemens supplied the systems and the evaluation software (shown in a demonstration scenario).

80 million passengers per year. Video-basedsurveillance and fire detection alarm systemsfrom Siemens help ensure the safety of passen-gers and ground personnel. More than onemillion tons of cargo are transshipped via theIllinois International Port District every year. In2005 Siemens was selected to provide perime-ter surveillance security improvements to theport’s Iroquois Landing and Calumet Harborfacilities. In line with tighter security stipula-tions for the nation’s coasts, the almost 50,000square-meter transshipment area is now under24/7 video surveillance.

Here, Siemens delivered an extensive videomonitoring system, which alongside camerasconsists of intelligent analysis software and ahigh-capacity network for data transmission.

guests and my people would sleep a lot easier,”says Cortez Trotter, formerly Chicago’s Fire Com-missioner and now Chief Emergency Officer.The fire detection system upgrade was under-taken by Hilton on its own initiative; it was notlegally obligated to do so.

Many theaters, international companies andbanks have put down roots in the area aroundMichigan Avenue. One of the most prominentof these is Boeing, which moved its corporateheadquarters from Seattle to Chicago in 2001.Large-scale building complexes such as theseneed efficient climate control systems. Siemenshas installed a building automation system thatsaves energy and improves occupant comfort inHyatt’s new Chicago headquarters building.Conserving energy is now a top priority, espe-

nicate temperatures along every point on aglass fiber. Siemens has used such glass fibersystems in subway systems in Beijing, Bangkokand Hong Kong, and in tunnel sections on thehigh-speed rail route between Madrid andBarcelona.

Until fire departments arrive on the scene,the system fights a fire primarily by controllingit, using fans to remove smoke and cooling thearea with sprinkler systems. This is the onlyway to reduce toxic gases, which can be ex-tremely hazardous.

Safe Harbors. The biggest cities are also theworld’s most important trading centers. Todate, the aspect of security that is most in thepublic eye has been the monitoring of people.Worldwide, however, government securityagencies are working to ensure more thoroughmonitoring of freight transport.

Rotterdam, the world’s seventh-largest sea-port and Europe’s largest container port, is

sites to the locations where they are emptied.Plans call for all ports worldwide to have accessto this infrastructure in the near future.

With the "Commerce Guard” solution, whichis marketed worldwide by a joint venture com-prising Siemens, General Electric, Mitsubishiand Samsung, a tamper-proof RFID device ismagnetically affixed to the interior of a con-tainer.

The system sounds an alarm every timea container door is opened without author-ization. It also transmits all the data on thecontainer’s ID, manifest and destination to asecure server when the container passes areading device at the port. The result is a se-cure corridor for freight transport.

With this technology, today’s big cities actu-ally have distinguished themselves from theirmedieval predecessors. They can protect notonly their citizens and their infrastructure, butalso the cargo that is in transit between urbantrading centers. � Katrin Nikolaus

Biometrics — A Quiet Revolution

“Biometrics is quietly revolutionizing everyday life,” says Gerd Hribernig (photo right), head

of the Biometrics Center that Siemens opened last Fall in Graz, Austria. A key reason for establishing

the center came courtesy of the United States, with its requirement that travelers arriving without

visas must have passports with photos and fingerprints in electronic formats. EU member nations

introduced passports with e-photos in 2006, and EU passports will be required to have fingerprints

by 2008. In Switzerland, the Siemens Biometrics Center has been commissioned by the government

to launch a pilot project with 100,000 participants. The binding of the new passport contains a

paper-thin RFID chip with an antenna, and the passport holder’s photo and personal data are stored

on the chip. This data can be remotely registered by special reading devices at minimal distances, for

example by customs authorities when travelers arrive in a foreign country. In these instances, a pass-

port holder can be photographed on the spot, and the new image can be compared to the one stored

on the chip. The advantage of this is that the passport photo displays a specific geometry in which

the position of the eyes, for example, can be carefully checked, making it virtually impossible to

travel on a forged or stolen passport. Companies have joined governments in making the most of

biometric methods. At Frankfurt/Main Airport, for example, Lufthansa and Siemens have started a

pilot project for testing check-in and boarding procedures that utilizes electronically stored finger-

prints. “It saves a lot of time at the airport for passengers taking short-haul flights,” explains

Hribernig. Experts expect biometric forms of identification to also gradually replace passwords and

electronic “keys” in the workplace, which is good news for the absent-minded among us. After all,

code words can be forgotten, and keys will sooner or later be misplaced — but you’re never without

your fingerprint.


Marine freight transport is becoming safer. Siemens’

Commerce Guard system ensures seamless monitor-

ing of containers, which are equipped with radio fre-

quency identification (RFID) tags.

Security in Liverpool: Smart image analysis.

playing a groundbreaking role in this area withits nuclear material detection system. Every-thing that moves through the port — more than330 million tons of goods per year — passesthrough one of 35 isotope detection portalsprovided by Siemens Netherlands. There arealso three mobile portals.

Using a system platform, the collected datais then fed directly into the data processing sys-tem of the Netherlands customs authoritiesand forwarded to other public agencies ifneeded. “This clearly makes Rotterdam one ofthe world’s safest, most secure ports,” saysWerner Krüdewagen of Siemens Building Tech-nologies.

Rotterdam will also become the world’s firstport to be equipped with a system that moni-tors containers in transit — from their loading

To meet this need, SCR is working on filteringout concrete information from movementdata: individuals moving faster than a crowd’saverage speed, or groups that suddenly changetheir direction of movement. Using a measure-ment of crowd density, predefined values canbe automatically set in motion. If there’s a riskof panic due to overcrowding on a train plat-form, for instance, the platform entrances canbe closed in time to defuse the situation.

Cameras that Call. In addition to object andanomaly detection and interpretation, smartvideo monitoring platforms will be able toseamlessly share information. For instance, if apotential medical emergency is detected suchas a person lying on the ground, a surveillanceplatform could automatically determine the po-sition of the nearest available rescue personnelusing WLAN. Emergency personnel will wearradio signal transmitters that continually ad-vise the system of their positions; a control sys-

If the situation requires, the needed infor-mation is automatically forwarded by advancedvoice alarm systems — the latest is the E100from Siemens. This system instructs people indanger zones to leave, naming the emergencyexits that should be used to ensure a safe, effi-cient evacuation. Simultaneous announcementskeep occupants of other parts of the buildingup to date as to the status of the situation.

“Compared to what’s often observed withwarnings consisting only of an alarm, peoplerespond more positively to voice announce-ments and are more likely to behave appropri-ately in such situations,” says Rütimann. In acontrol center, in turn, the E100 automaticallyactivates a protocol including response instruc-tions and automated procedures for securitypersonnel. “This prevents incorrect reactionsarising due to stress,” Rütimann explains.

One consequence of 9/11 is the realizationthat every new high-rise building should have aback-up control center outside the building itself.

Livable Megacities | Security

Siemens is working intensively to developautomatic image-processing systems that willbe able to interpret data (Pictures of the Future,Fall 2006, pp. 83, 86). Thanks to the acquisi-tion of the U.S. company VistaScape in late2006, Siemens is able to offer a system plat-form that uses defined rules to interpret data itcompiles from cameras, sensors, radar and ul-trasound systems.

“We use this platform to monitor very largeoutdoor areas such as harbors and airports,”explains Peter Löffler, who is responsible forsmart video surveillance at Siemens BuildingTechnologies in Zug, Switzerland. The systemdepicts objects, for example pedestrians andcars, as symbols on three-dimensional modelsof aerial views. The system’s users see the ob-jects in terms of their size, direction, and speedof movement. If radar detects an unfamiliarobject, for instance, the system calculateswhich camera is best positioned to supplymore precise images. “This is a big leap forward


High-rise buildings such as Taipei 101 require a specialized security solutions. In London, cameras monitor nearly all public spaces (center).

from earlier video analysis systems,” Löfflerexplains.

What’s more, Siemens Corporate Research(SCR) in Princeton is developing algorithmsthat are opening up new areas of applicationfor automated video monitoring. By thissummer, SCR researchers expect that it will bepossible to determine on a monitor which per-son belongs with a specific piece of luggage,for example. With this smart link, an alarm willnot be issued if the luggage owner leaves it tosimply walk a few meters to a trash bin; butit will be if he or she is absent for a longerduration.

Amorphous crowds of people pose thegreatest challenge for future monitoring sys-tems. “We need algorithms that can evaluatethe characteristics of crowds,” explains Löffler.

tem would then then handle communicationsand manage the response.

Such combined surveillance and informa-tion platforms would be particularly helpful inthe world’s largest buildings, such as Taiwan’s509 meter-tall Taipei 101 and the 700 meter-tall Burj Dubai apartment and office tower,which is now under construction. The fifth-tallest building today is the Jin Mao building inShanghai, which Siemens equipped with fireand personnel safety protection systems.“We’ve installed about 4,500 fire detectors onthe building’s 88 floors,” says Lance Rütimannof SBT. A fire in the skyscraper would mostlikely require the evacuation of thousands ofpeople. The system in Shanghai reports indica-tions of a fire, determines its location and noti-fies response teams.

If the main control center has been damagedor destroyed, the back-up center can take over.

Seamless fire protection is also needed intransportation tunnels in megacities. In thisconnection, Siemens equips subway and rail-road tunnels with multifunctional fire protec-tion systems. Such systems not only detectfires, but can determine their exact positions,activate fire extinguishing systems, close accesspoints and, of course, sound alarms (Pictures ofthe Future, Fall 2005, p.13).

Due to the thick smoke and wind speeds ofup to ten meters per second that characterizemajor tunnel fires, conventional fire alarmsoften fail. Used instead are heat sensors or,especially for very long tunnels, laser light viaglass fiber cables. By measuring the intensity ofbackscattered light, such a system can commu-

Livable Megacities | London


Although she lives in the city with theworld’s oldest and longest (408 kilometers)

subway system, Kiki Fragkou always takes thebus to the university. “It usually takes a little lesstime by bus,” says Fragkou, who is from Greeceand is studying economics. “The subway some-times gets stuck because of signal problems.Besides, with the bus I usually get a seat.”Those who ride the Tube — as the London sub-way is called — are sure to sweat, as the lack ofair conditioning sometimes pushes tempera-tures up to more than 40 degrees Celsius in thesummer. Despite a huge increase in London’s

power plants that provide the government dis-trict in Whitehall with electricity. In addition,the company is involved in innovative out-sourcing projects in the health care sector andthe city’s media industry (see box, page 31).

In other words, Siemens is implementingsolutions to problems whose causes mightmake other big cities jealous. For example, theannoying traffic jams — the worst in Europe —are to a certain extent nothing more than thenegative side of the growth and success ofBritain’s capital. Bankers consider London to bethe most important and best internationallynetworked financial hub anywhere — a city ofeven greater significance in this regard thanNew York. The crowds of financial professionalswho pour out of the Bank and Canary Wharfsubway stations each day come from all overthe world, as do Kiki Fragkou’s fellow studentsat the London School of Economics.

Mayor Livingstone believes London’s suc-cess is exemplary of a “new era of economicglobalization.” He plans to use the 2012Olympic Games, which will take place in Lon-don, as a vehicle for launching some of themost ambitious infrastructure projects Londonhas seen in decades. Along with the newOlympic Park and sports facilities, event organ-

izers plan to expand transport routes and builda press center for more than 20,000 journal-ists. They also plan to build apartments to ac-commodate up to 10,500 athletes, introduceadvanced security systems, and provide state-of-the-art energy supply systems.

Where’s the Bus? Livingstone wants to fur-ther improve traffic in London before the 2012games by encouraging commuters to use pub-lic transit. Driving is becoming more expensivein central London, while the public transportsystem is being expanded and made moreefficient with the help of initiatives such as theiBus project. London’s red buses transportaround 1.5 billion people each year — and thisfigure is expected to increase by 40 percentin the period from 2001 to 2011, according tothe city’s transport agency, Transport for Lon-don (TfL).

To accommodate this growth, Siemens isnow installing a satellite-based bus informationsystem that will replace the current radio bea-cons used to track bus positions. The new sys-tem will enable private bus operators, TfL and— in emergencies — the police and other secu-rity agencies to pinpoint the precise location ofeach of the 8,000 buses now in service. The key

here will be a combination of GPS satellite dataand GPRS mobile communications technology,whereby GPS will roughly determine the loca-tion of a bus down to 100-meters. Data calcu-lated by on-boards and transmitted every 30seconds via GPRS specifies the position of eachbus relative to the bus network. A central com-puter depicts the overall image derived fromthe data provided by all buses.

As a result, drivers will be better informed asto whether their bus is running on time. Pas-sengers will ultimately benefit the most, how-ever, according to Brian Higbee, manager ofthe Public Transport business unit at SiemensVDO, who helped develop the system. “Themore precise data will enable us to intervenemore quickly in the scheduling process, for ex-ample in the event of traffic jams. This will helpensure that two buses don’t run more or lesstogether — one full and the other empty,” hesays. The state-of-the-art technology Siemensis providing will also help improve the punctu-ality of buses in coming years and keep faresdown by ensuring optimal capacity utilizationof the fleet. The iBus project is valued ataround €175 million and is part of a hugeinvestment program for local public transportin London that will see TfL injecting some €15

population over the last few decades, few newsubway lines have been built. As a result, it canbe hard to find a seat on the train. “London’s in-frastructure has suffered greatly from threedecades of under-investment,” said city MayorKen Livingstone years ago.

In his most recent urban developmentstrategy paper, Livingstone warned of the direconsequences further growth may have for thecity. For example, London’s population is ex-pected to grow from 7.6 million today to wellover eight million by 2016. And if the suburbsare included, the population will exceed 15

million. The goal is to manage this growth so asto avoid a collapse of the transportation infra-structure while diminishing the city’s impact onthe environment.

Siemens technology is already helping inmany areas. For example, the company hassupplied traffic guidance systems and moderntrains on lines such as the Heathrow Express,which brings mostly business travelers fromthe airport to the city center in just 15 minuteswhile they watch BBC news on flat screens.Siemens has also delivered power supply sys-tems, including state-of-the-art gas turbine

Bankers, scientists, artists — London attracts skilledand talented people from all over the world. But expansion of the city’s infrastructure has not alwayskept up with the rapid growth in population. Siemenstechnology is now helping Europe’s biggest city makebetter use of existing infrastructures.

In around ten years, Greater London will have 15

million inhabitants, making it Europe’s largest

metropolis. To help manage growth, the city plans to

make its transport system more efficient.

Massive investment program. Transport for London is spending 15 billion euros on the infrastructure over five years.

Building aBetter Life inthe City


Offering BBC Content on Demand

Some people at the British Broadcasting

Corporation (BBC) have nicknamed their Tele-

vision Centre the “Doughnut.” The ring-shaped

structure is the home of BBC Studios and a sym-

bol of the company’s 65-year history. The future

of the BBC is now set to become even brighter

thanks to state-of-the-art technology and cre-

ative programming. A few minute’s walk away

is the company’s Broadcasting Centre. This is

where the BBC’s future is being created. “We are now relying on digital technology instead of ferrying

videos back and forth,” says BBC Digital Media Controller Paul Cheesbrough. Creative teams working at

computers spread over several floors of a light-flooded atrium are responsible for transforming con-

tent produced by their colleagues in the BBC Television Centre or at BBC studios all over the UK into a

variety of BBC products and services. The digital approach also makes it possible to produce news

items for television at a lower cost while also adapting them for the BBC website. These days, media

users are increasingly looking for on-demand content, so the old model where various stations broad-

cast in parallel is looking outdated. That’s why the BBC is working on “BBC iPlayer,” a product that will

enable users to download select programs from the Internet for up to a week after they are broadcast.

“We’re using state-of-the-art technology here to enter a completely new market,” says BBC Internet

Controller Tony Ageh. “Offering BBC content on demand is our response to the changes in consumer

behavior brought about by the Internet.” The one-way street of broadcasters sending out programs to

a mass of consumers is being transformed into a partnership — and Siemens is helping to make it hap-

pen. “Along with the procurement of IT and Telephony, we’ve also outsourced some of our key broad-

cast technology to Siemens,” says Cheesbrough. “Finding the right partner was essential — especially

since we’ve passed on a lot of our expertise in the process. In the end, though, we benefit greatly from

the size and scale of Siemens as well as its experience in other industry sectors.” The most important

thing, however, is that the partnership with Siemens helps to make innovative projects like the BBC

iPlayer a reality. Says Cheesbrough: “By providing us with integrated digital processes, Siemens will

help us to combine our production and distribution processes. And that will enable us to provide

license fee payers with additional value.”

Siemens supplied the technology for the newsection. Siemens will also service the toll sys-tem until 2016. Video cameras continue to beemployed in the new area. However, instead ofusing analog technology to transmit images toa control center (as was previously done), thenew Siemens solution processes the video datain the new area on site by transforming imagesof license plates into digital certificates. Theseare then sent to the control center in encryptedform via an IP broadband network. The lowervolume of data involved reduces operatingcosts, so that more money is left over from thetoll itself. The savings will be used to furtherimprove the local public transport system.

Siemens also supplies equipment that auto-mates and controls complex winching and fly-ing systems for props and actors. West Endshows that have recently used Siemens technol-ogy include “Sinatra” and “The Sound of Music.”

The Tate Modern gallery on the southern bankof the Thames also uses lighting technologyfrom Siemens. Housed in a former power plant,the gallery has become yet another trademarkof London. At night, the energy-saving, low-maintenance lights at the tip of its smokestackhave the appearance of a glowing blue space-ship. Meanwhile, on the inside, Siemens fire-protection solutions ensure that visitors and art-work remain safe should a fire break out.

Detecting Suspicious Events Faster. Secu-rity technology is also becoming increasinglyimportant — not least due to the terroristattacks on London’s subway system and busesin July 2005. Prior to the attacks, Siemens hadalready installed an integrated video monitoringsystem for Network Rail, which operates thecity’s biggest train stations (p. 25). That systemhas since been upgraded, allowing videoimages to be stored on a central server, ratherthan on individual tapes. And thanks to its easy-to-use graphic interface, operators and authori-ties can analyze data faster when suspicious sit-uations arise and thus react more rapidly. Infact, the system helped identify several of thesuspects involved in the 2005 bombings.

Private companies also require comprehen-sive security solutions, particularly in the City,which is London’s original financial center, andat Canary Wharf, where many banks and serv-ice companies have settled since the 1990s. Aformer harbor site, Canary Wharf now boasts animpressive collection of skyscrapers on thebanks of the Thames. It’s a “sub-center” thattakes the load off the overburdened City. In theevent of a fire, explosion, or similar crisis,Siemens technology will, for example, exploit

intelligent fire-alarm systems to prevent theworst from happening. As the technology itselfis extremely reliable, the challenge faced by Ja-son Matthews, service operations manager at ITSolutions and Services, is to make sure there areno false alarms, “which can end up being veryexpensive, especially for an investment bank. Iftraders have to leave their work stations andcan no longer keep up with international mar-kets, they might miss the deal of their lives.”

For this reason, if an alarm does goes off inthe roughly 200-meter-high Citibank building,not all of the 20,000 to 30,000 employees pres-ent during the daytime will be evacuated imme-diately. Instead, only those located on the floorsclosest to where the event is believed to be willbe evacuated initially. “And if there really is afire, firefighters will get everyone else outthrough all different exits,” says Matthews. Be-cause video cameras monitor the movement ofpeople fleeing from the fire, officials can guidethe people being evacuated away from danger-ous stairwells by making announcements overthe building’s public address system.

Of course, the customer gets the most valueout of such a system when disastrous eventsdon’t occur. “In that case, bankers can concen-trate on making money. As the building man-ager, we ensure that all the technology func-tions without a hitch,” says Steve Savage, fromNorland Managed Services at Citigroup, who isresponsible for integrating Siemens solutions atCitibank in Canary Wharf.

“Siemens is a good partner,” he says,“ andthat’s important because building managementis a long-term business in which reliability is ofparamount importance. Siemens can also quicklyadapt its solutions to changing customer re-quirements by tapping into knowledge from itsGroups.” This will be the case, for example,when the Citibank building’s video monitoringsystem is upgraded and integrated with its fire-protection system.

Livable Megacities | London

Siemens’ expertise is also sometimes chan-neled directly into the customer’s businessprocesses. This is being done, for instance, withoutsourcing projects carried out for the BBC(see box) and public authorities. For example,Siemens is converting 250 million paper docu-ments into digital files for Britain’s Office for Na-tional Statistics. As a result, UK citizens will beable to trace their ancestors digitally — throughbirth, marriage and death certificates — all theway back to 1837.

Healthy Contract. Municipal authorities andprivate companies aren’t the only ones to bene-fit from outsourcing technological expertise toSiemens. For example, Barts Hospital and TheRoyal London Hospital have decided to let Sie-mens handle the procurement and mainte-nance of their medical equipment. To this end,they have signed a €445 million contract withSiemens, under the provisions of which thecompany will provide state-of-the-art medicaldevices tailored to the needs of the two hospi-

tals, which are now being completely over-hauled. The contract will run for more than 35years — from 2009 to 2045. Paul White, CEO ofboth hospitals, says that Londoners will benefitgreatly from the agreement. “The redevelop-ment of Barts Hospital and The Royal LondonHospital will deliver world-class medical facili-ties for the people of East London — and be-yond,” he says. After all, London attracts peoplefrom all over the country, who go there to workor have fun.

Due to the large contribution the service sec-tor makes to gross domestic product in the Lon-don metropolitan area, many people refer toLondon as the home of the “knowledge econ-omy.” That’s a fitting description given that it isat the top of the value chains of many interna-tional economic sectors in the networked globaleconomy. Who knows, perhaps Kiki Fragkouwill also stay in London after she completes herstudies. “The city is certainly stressful,” she says,“but it offers tremendous opportunities.”

� Andreas Kleinschmidt

billion into the system over a five-year period.Among other things, a new bridge will be builtacross the Thames, the light-rail network in thecity’s East End will be expanded, and the exist-ing Tube network will be modernized.

iBus will also make one of Kiki Fragkou’swishes come true, as an increasing number ofbus stops will be equipped with electronicinformation boards that use the processedsatellite data to provide more reliable informa-tion on when the next bus will be pulling in.“Providing modern and accurate informationsystems to our passengers is critical to attract-ing more people onto London Buses,” says TfLCommissioner Peter Hendy. And even if all the

separate bus lanes can’t prevent the red busesfrom getting caught in traffic, passengers willat least know how much longer they’ll have towait before they’re picked up.

Coded License Plates. Quality of life in thecenter of London is already improving. For in-stance, since its introduction in 2003, the city’sCongestion Charge system has resulted in a 21percent reduction in the number of vehiclesdriving into the city center and a 26 percent re-duction in traffic jams. The toll has cut gasolineconsumption by around 66 million liters andCO2 emissions by 150,000 tons annually. A tripinto town now costs eight pounds for the day.Video cameras register the license plates of thevehicles that enter and compare the numberswith a database. Anyone who doesn’t pay thecharge via the Internet or by phone is heavilyfined. What’s more, the area covered by thecharge was expanded in February 2007, and

Taken together, these measures are expect-ed to improve the attractiveness of life in thecity center — for local residents as well astourists, 27 million of whom flock to Europe’slargest city every year.

One of the first places many visit is theworld-famous theater district in London’s WestEnd, where Agatha Christie’s “The Mousetrap”has been running for 55 years — and wheremany of the old theater buildings look as if theyhaven’t been freshly painted in about as long.“We need to invest around 250 million poundsover the next ten years, in order to refurbish ourtraditional private theaters,” says Richard Pul-ford of the Society of London Theatre. Modernbuilding technology will be used here. Similartechnology has already been used at the Princeof Wales Theatre near Piccadilly Circus, whereOsram halogen lamps have been putting theArt Nouveau auditorium in the right light eversince the building was renovated in 2004.

Recipe for success: Improve public transportand invest in safety and comfort

Automated toll collection (left) has cut traffic jams

by 26 percent. Security cameras (center) monitor

central London, and Siemens building automation

systems enhance safety in office complexes (right).


Livable Megacities | Noise Prevention


One day people will have to battle noise asbitterly as they did cholera and the plague

in the past,” predicted Robert Koch, who wasawarded the Nobel Prize for Medicine just un-der a century ago. The fact that he was right isproven by the existence of professional noise-reduction experts like Holger Ennes, a memberof a six-person team at Siemens Power Gener-ation in Erlangen, Germany. Sitting at a largemonitor, Ennes uses special software to simu-late techniques for toning down the noise gen-erated by a combined-cycle power plant thathas an output of several hundred megawatts.

Some of the disturbing sounds are createdin the cooling tower by huge fans that con-dense the steam from the turbine back intowater. Others come from a gas turbine thatscreeches like a jet taking off. But despite allthis activity, acoustic experts have succeededin turning the roar from such plants into awhisper. “We could place such a facility in a cityand people around it wouldn’t know it was apower plant,” says Ennes. “They would hardly

tion. A ten-decibel reduction is perceived as aroughly 50-percent decrease in noise volume.

Experts in acoustics can achieve this in avariety of ways. For example, simulations willshow them how well the hall facade shoulddampen noise, how powerful the gas turbines’noise dampeners should be, whether thepumps will require noise-dampening hoods,whether low-noise transformers and machinesshould be used, and whether heat recoverysteam generators need to be insulated. Suchmeasures can cost five percent of a powerplant’s contract volume, which often totalshundreds of millions of euros.

A computer simulation program adds up allnoise sources and calculates the plant’s totalsound propagation. “The calculation can takeup to two days, depending on the size and com-plexity of the plant,” says Ennes. But in the end,it produces a “noise map” in which color-codedsound contours form a ring around the facilityand individual buildings. Areas with the sameacoustic pressure are the same color. The colors

Excessive noise is a problem all over the world. Noise in cities not only can lead tostress, but can actually make people ill. That’s why Siemens strives to keep the noiselevels of its products for cars, trains and even entire power plants as low as possible.

Sound propagation around a power plant. Areas

with the same acoustic pressure have the same

color. Acoustics experts use simulations like this

to develop effective noise-protection measures.

Quieter vehicles. Because the Velaro

high-speed electric train (above) is very

aerodynamic, it operates more quietly than

other trains. In typical diesel engines, piezo

injection (below) helps to reduce noise levels.

The Color of Quiet

hear what was going on inside.” Ennes and hiscolleagues consider not only nearby residents,but also the people who work in power plants.Using a building block approach, they put to-gether new power plants piece by piece oncomputer screens, modeling the cooling tow-ers, boilers, gas turbines, transformers, pumpsand fans three-dimensionally. Each componenthas a precisely measured and calculated noiseoutput level. “For the simulation, we also needother data, such as the plant’s distance fromthe nearest private residences,” says Ennes.

Red Means Loud. Regulations in Germanystipulate that the noise level of a new powerplant — measured from the nearest residence— must be ten decibels lower than the level ofambient noise measured before the facility wasbuilt. This means that if around 43 dB(A) (com-parable to light radio music) is measured out-side someone’s bedroom at night due to streetnoise, the noise from a power plant built in thevicinity may not exceed 33 dB(A) at that loca-

range from dark red for very loud to light greenfor very quiet. Parameters are then adjusted un-til residential areas are in the green zone, whichmeans that people in nearby residential areaswill be able to enjoy a good night’s sleep.

According to Germany’s Fraunhofer Insti-tute for Structural Durability (LBF), over 100million people in Europe are affected by noise.Road traffic is the biggest culprit, followed bynoisy neighbors, airplanes, trains and noisefrom industry and businesses. To help find aremedy, Prof. Holger Hanselka from the LBFlaunched a noise reduction project in 2004 incooperation with the Technical University ofDarmstadt. With a budget of 3334 million eu-ros, the project develops new materials thatwill make machines, cars, planes and trainsquieter. A total of 42 partners, includingSiemens Transportation Systems (TS), from 13

will soon be covering the new 625-kilometerstretch from Madrid to Barcelona at a speed of350 kilometers per hour. It will make the trip,which took four hours in its predecessor, in twoand a half hours. Noise emissions — especiallythose related to wind resistance from — havealso been reduced by TS developers.

Normally, at high speeds, every crevice andedge generates whistling sounds. That’s whythe Velaro’s roof, including its pantograph,have been streamlined. What’s more, apronsinstalled between the undercarriage and trackalso reduce wind noise, as do wheel coveringson the chassis. The train’s suspension wasmodified as well. Dampers now minimize theoscillations of the railcar body in the low-frequency range between five and 400 Hertz,thereby ensuring maximum comfort in the rail-car interior.

Moninger believes the dampers offer partic-ular potential. “The trend is toward intelligentsystems,” he says. So-called “yaw” dampersimprove a train’s performance in curves bymechanically suppressing the oscillations aris-ing in the curves. Active yaw dampers that usedata from sensors and electronic systems to au-tonomously adjust to oscillations in curves andso suppress noise are being developed. Thesedevices will make it possible to better controlthe forces in curves — particularly when heavylocomotives are involved — and thus optimallytransfer the motor power to the rails.

Compact and Quiet. TS’ latest contributionto rail noise reduction is its Syntegra system,which for the first time combines the chassis,drive system and brakes into one unit that issmaller, more compact and lighter than aconventional chassis (Pictures of the Future,Spring 2006, p. 62). Syntegra trains will maketheir commercial debut in the Munich subwaysystem in summer 2007. The new design hasmade it possible to eliminate the transmission,as the wheels are driven directly by a synchro-nous motor. The traction motor fan has alsobeen eliminated, further reducing noise levels.

Siemens VDO automotive is embarking ona similar noise reduction path by planning thedevelopment of a new type of drive system.Specialists working on a project called“eCorner” have combined the engine, brakesand steering system into a “hub motor” (p. 99)— a complete, purely electrical powertrain.Although the system remains a dream for thefuture, one part of it — the electronic wedgebrake — should be ready for mass productionby 2010. Electric cars based on eCorner tech-nology will produce no combustion noises,making them much quieter than today’s vehi-cles, even when accelerating rapidly.

The combustion engine itself has also beensignificantly improved in recent years. For ex-ample, the typical diesel knocking noise cannow be heard only in older vehicles. The rea-son: high-pressure piezo injection systems.With this piezo technology, more fuel injec-tions can be used. As a result, the pressure inthe cylinder rises very gradually during com-bustion, thereby reducing noise levels. In thepast, combustion was essentially explosive.“For us, the next step will be to use combus-tion management systems to select up toseven individual injections that can be pre-cisely positioned from a total of 11 possibleinjections,” says Dr. Klaus Wenzlawski fromSiemens VDO. In this way, it will be possible toreduce irritating noises step by step anddecibel by decibel — thus making life a littlequieter for everyone. � Rolf Sterbak

European countries are involved. Specialists inrail systems technology, for instance, are exam-ining new materials for rail vehicle fans. Espe-cially in diesel locomotives, cabinet-sized fanstransfer engine heat to the outside, creatingloud vibrations. By stiffening under pressure,the new materials will reduce vibrations.

“We’ve been working on making trains qui-eter for a long time,” says TS innovation expertFriedrich Moninger. One example is the low-noise Eurorunner locomotive that hit the railsin 2002. Today, around 180 of the units are inoperation. The 80-ton, two-megawatt diesellocomotive is significantly quieter than the le-gal maximum for rail vehicles. This decrease isdue to sidewalls made of an aluminum honey-comb sandwich structure instead of thin, stiff-ened sheet steel; large fans with lower speeds;wheel disk brakes instead of loud shoe brakes;and an encapsulated engine compartmentwith sound insulation.

Europe’s newest and fastest series-producedpassenger railcar, the electric-powered Velaro

Livable Megacities | Lighting


Atruly staggering array of lights more fabu-lous than anything ever dreamed up in

a fairy tale will light up the big cities of thefuture,” predicted art historian and architecturecritic Walter Riezler back in 1928. The long andsuccessful history of the light bulb had onlyjust begun at that time. In fact, Osram, with itsfamous light bulb logo, had been establishedjust nine years earlier, on July 1, 1919. Thecompany’s portfolio eventually included fluo-rescent lights and halogen and high-pressuredischarge lamps.

Still, the “truly staggering array” of lightsthat will illuminate the magacities is yet tocome, says Wolfgang Lex, head of the LEDdivision at Osram Opto Semiconductors (OsramOS). According to Lex, light-emitting diodes

The efficiency of LEDs, such as the Ostarunit from Osram, now stands at 75 lumens perwatt (lm/W). By comparison, an incandescentbulb achieves only 12 lm/W and energy-savinglamps manage 50 – 60 lm/W. Moreover, theprice of an LED — once the biggest argumentagainst the diodes — will fall dramatically whenthe units are mass produced. LEDs also recouptheir investment quickly, because an LED has alifespan of 50,000 hours, which is around 50times longer than that of an incandescentbulb. So, if you bought LEDs that produced thesame amount of light as a 60-watt incandes-cent bulb, you’d pay about 60 euros (comparedto 40 euros for 50 conventional bulbs). But,thanks to the LEDs’ higher efficiency and lifetime,you’d save about 430 euros over 50,000 hours.

Light-emitting diodes and luminescent plastics are changing the way cities are lit.These innovative sources of light, which are economical, efficient and long-lasting, will illuminate our days and nights in new ways. For example, they will be used asguidance elements in sidewalks, as displays, as virtual sunlight in offices, as transparent room dividers, and as illuminated wallpaper and ceilings in homes.

LEDs in architecture. The “Seven Screens” obelisk in

front of Osram HQ in Munich (large photo), lighting

for an event at the Stone Bridge in Regensburg (bot-

tom left) and cobblestones in Geneva (right).

Twisted tower. Some 14,000 white Osram LEDs

light up the Turning Torso in Malmö, Sweden.

Let There Be Light

(LEDs) and luminescent plastics (organic light-emitting diodes — OLEDs) will once again fundamentally alter lighting as we know it.“However, instead of a revolution, we’ll be wit-nessing a slow evolution,” he says.

For years, nobody paid much attention toLEDs. In fact, it took around 30 years for LEDsto evolve from the red operation mode displaysof the 1970s to the white diodes of recenttimes. Now, however, the mini-lights are setto become the stars of lighting technology.LEDs can stand up to light bulbs, fluorescenttubes, and halogen and xenon lights in everyrespect. They are extremely long lasting andefficient, take up very little space, emit lowlevels of heat and can be installed in a veryflexible manner.

Designers and engineers are constantlycoming up with new applications for LEDs.“The clear trends today are to cut costs andconserve resources,” says Ulrich Kastner-Jung,head of Strategic Marketing at Osram OS. “LEDscan also help an aging population feel safer byilluminating sidewalks, subway stations andemergency exits. What’s more, LEDs not onlylight things up but can also communicate infor-mation as displays on interactive walls.”

The future has already begun on the road.Originally installed as rear-window brake lights,red LEDs are now being used in more and morecars for the rear brake lights themselves. Onereason for this development is LEDs’ ability tolight up 150 milliseconds more rapidly thanbulbs, which could mean the difference be-tween life and death for a driver behind anabruptly braking vehicle. And inevitably LEDswill eventually be used in headlights as well. In2005, for example, the Hella company demon-strated a bending light that uses LEDs that turnduring curves. Meanwhile, in a pilot project,Osram has installed LEDs as daytime running

ian capital will not incur any additional costs asa result of the conversion, as the payments re-quired for installation of the new technologyare lower than the savings achieved throughreduced power consumption and the elimina-tion of maintenance costs.

LED Sidewalks. “It would even be possible toset up an entire traffic guidance system usingLEDs, including information displays, illumi-nated traffic signs and variable lane markings,”says Lex. “Initial tests are now under way in theNetherlands to replace white lane markings withLED strips,” he says. Pedestrians will also bene-fit from LED beams placed in cobblestones andilluminated LED strips in sidewalks, both ofwhich could eventually replace streetlights. “Oneof the big advantages is that you could set itup so that sensors would activate the lightsonly when someone passes by,” says Lex.

LEDs are gradually taking over in architec-tural designs and artwork for public spaces aswell. For example, a fountain that also servesas an interactive image screen has been built in

LEDS are the lighting system of choice forfast-growing cities, as they also allow com-pletely new forms of architecture to be real-ized. The cities of tomorrow are in fact alreadyon display in Singapore, Shanghai and Mum-bai. Whereas Europeans tend to favor whiteLEDs, skyscrapers in these Asian cities arebathed in the most colorful tones. “Asian citiesare pioneers in lighting architecture,” says Lex.“Every highrise has its own individual lightingdecorations, which are increasingly being im-plemented with LEDs. A particularly successfulexample of this trend is the New World Centerin Hong Kong, whose colorful light displaystretches over 15 floors. The light show wasrealized using LED strips from Osram. And theTurning Torso in Malmö, Sweden — at 190meters, Europe’s second tallest residentialbuilding — illustrates how LEDs are movinginto building interiors. The hallways on everyfloor in the tower, which is shaped like astrand of DNA, are filled with more than14,000 white LEDs from Osram. The diodeswere chosen because of their longevity and

lights in the new Audi R8’s headlights. Thanksto the economical tiny diodes, daytime runninglights can be used with virtually no increasefuel consumption. Siemens has also developedLED headlights for the BR 189 European loco-motive (Pictures of the Future, Fall 2003, p. 41).

We’ll also be seeing more LEDs on streets,now that local authorities are increasingly in-stalling them in traffic lights. San José, Califor-nia, is a pioneer in this regard. California’s third-largest city has equipped around 900 trafficlights with LEDs. As a result, annual associatedcosts have been slashed by nearly $1.7 millionto $160,000. Budapest has commissionedSiemens to replace light bulbs in all of its33,000 traffic lights with LEDs. The financingplan for the project is so smart that the Hungar-

Chicago’s Millennium Park. The glass structure,which is 15 meters high, alternately flashes col-ored backgrounds and photos of Chicago citi-zens across its cube-shaped surface. Passersbyare amazed when water shoots out of themouth of a giant digital face in the fountain.

The “Seven Screens” obelisks that Osrambuilt in front of its Munich headquarters arealso attracting a lot of attention. The obeliskscontain more than 750,000 high-performanceLEDs that are controlled by a central computervia fiber optic cables. Each pixel here is capableof depicting 16 million colors. People who lookat the first video installation on the SevenScreens say that the shadows of the men andwomen depicted by this work of art seem torun from obelisk to obelisk.

Light: A Spectrum of Applications

In a study entitled “Picture of the Lighting Future,” Osram examined the

trends, technologies and customer requirements that will dominate the lighting

market in ten to 15 years’. Alongside the global trend toward sustainable prod-

ucts, Osram researchers predict the advent of completely new types of light

sources and application areas.

The study employed the “Pictures of the Future” methodology that Siemens

uses for strategic planning. In this case, specialists from Osram and Siemens

conducted around 50 interviews with external experts, defined key technologies

and examined their impact on regional markets. The results were used to create

detailed scenarios for various areas of life, which were then combined to gener-

ate business ideas for Osram.

One of the most important findings from the study is the trend toward energy-

conserving light sources. And there’s good reason for this trend. Lighting con-

sumes 19 percent of all the electricity generated worldwide. In terms of the cur-

rent energy mix, that’s the equivalent of 1.6 billion tons of CO2 emissions per

year, or the emissions produced by 500 million passenger cars traveling 20,000

kilometers per year and emitting 160 grams of CO2 per kilometer. What’s more,

lighting-related electricity consumption can be expected to double over the next

ten years in Asia alone. At present, an average American uses around 30 times

more lighting (expressed as lumens x time) than does an average person in

India and ten times more than a person in China. Probably the best way to limit

this trend is to use energy-saving lamps and light-emitting diodes, which not


A Day in the Year 2020

Frank Lee is awakened by a very unusual alarm clock in the form of a light

screen on the ceiling of his hotel room that emits a dawn-like reddish light and

the sound of chirping birds. He gets dressed, has breakfast and drives off in his

rental car to a meeting. It’s still dark and cold outside, and the automated LED

traffic lights on the road stay green as long as there are no other vehicles at the

intersections. Suddenly the warning “Icy road ahead!” appears on the head-up

display on the windshield. This is followed by an infrared image of a pedestrian

who is crossing the road some distance away (left picture). “Wow, if it wasn’t for

that night vision assistant I wouldn’t have seen him,” Frank says to himself, and

slows down a little. The streetlights are out, which is unusual, given that they’re

supposed to switch on whenever someone walks on the sidewalk.

Well, at least the safety lights integrated into the road are working. Frank saw

them turn red when his car approached. In other words, nobody should have

risked walking onto the road. Frank can now see the beautiful city skyline up

ahead. He loves the lighting designs on the skyscrapers and small temples, the

blue laser lights that dance across the peaks of the waves on the beach and the

fabulous 3D effects that can be seen in different parts of the sky. He’s also often

amused by the giant ads that appear on the walls of buildings. Fortunately,

however, the city’s Committee on Light Pollution has limited the number of

such ads to ensure that they don’t become too distracting.

The cameras in Frank’s augmented reality navigation system have found the

building he’s driving to, which Frank can now see marked in green on his wind-

only consume 80 percent less electricity

for the same light output, but also last

15 – 50 times longer than conventional

incandescent light bulbs. In other

words, an energy-saving lamp can

reduce CO2 emissions by half a ton

throughout its entire lifespan.

Osram researchers also predict that

more and more complete lighting

systems consisting of lamps or light-

emitting diodes (LEDs), sensors and

electronic systems will be sold in the

future, rather than individual compo-

nents. Such systems could use motion

detectors to adjust to requirements at

a given time, thereby ensuring that en-

ergy savings are optimized. In addition,

solar cell systems, rechargeable batter-

ies and LED lamps could provide light

for the 1.5 billion people who are cur-

rently using gas and petroleum lamps,

which are dangerous to their health.

New technologies are opening up

completely new possibilities and giving

lighting system designers unprecedented

flexibility. Such technologies include point-shaped LEDs and wide-area organic

light-emitting diodes (OLEDs), which enable the development of flexible light

sources, transparent light walls, luminescent tiles and adhesive films, as well as

integrated ceiling lights. The new light sources are also ideal for signs, billboards,

lighting effects in clothing, jewelry and furniture, as well as exciting new lighting

architectures. Displays using the new technologies will be on view everywhere

— in cell phones, roll-out electronic newspapers or wallpaper that changes its

design, and Internet, TV and video terminals.

Alongside sustainability, the focus in Europe will be on comfort and safety,

whereby the alteration of lighting colors and moods, combined with a clever

mixture of natural and artificial light, will influence people’s feelings. Intelligent

emergency and exit guidance lighting will improve safety in houses and on

streets, sidewalks and squares. Context-related light sources will create new

applications, one of which will involve the installation of tiny light sources,

linked to temperature sensors, into water faucets. When hot, the water stream

will light up red; when cool it will turn blue. Light will also be used more fre-

quently in health care — for example, in devices that emit “light showers,”

which provide people with more energy by stimulating serotonin production

and suppressing melatonin production. In addition, light can be used to treat

certain types of skin disorders. Doctors and surgeons will also use laser light

more frequently, not only as scalpels and optical tweezers, but also to conduct

fluorescent-optical analyses of cancer cells. � Ulrich Eberl

shield — along with the street he has to take

to get there. All he has to do is follow the

glowing light green path superimposed on

the real street that points the way.

Once in the conference room, Frank runs

into two colleagues who are preparing a giant

wall display for a virtual meeting with Canada

and Brazil. Over the next hour, Frank and a

colleague from Canada review the current

status of a development project for a col-

league in Brazil. The project in question in-

volves a personalized interior lighting system

for a new vehicle.

Later he tells his girlfriend, Suzy, about the

conference when they meet at a karaoke bar.

Before doing so, however, he activates a light

wall that separates them from the next table

in order to give them privacy. These transpar-

ent room dividers made of luminescent plas-

tic can also be filled with pictures to make

them opaque. The dazzling lights in the bar

lend a glitter to Suzy’s jewelry and combine

well with the illuminated fibers sewn into her

new dress.

Frank and Suzy then go back to Suzy’s new

apartment, where she shows off its technical highlights (top picture). Ultraviolet

light radiators ensure reliable water disinfection in the kitchen and bathroom, a

perfectly aligned combination of spotlights and area lights illuminate the entire

apartment. There are also tasteful touches of light in the furniture and floor, a

holographic fire in a virtual fireplace and automatic mixing of natural daylight...

Frank has to admit that Suzy’s apartment is surely a lighting designer’s dream

come true.

He finds the remote control and, after several attempts, transforms the transpar-

ent foil in front of the window into a nice hilly landscape complete with horses,

a river and sailboats on a lake. Noticing that Suzy is looking at him, he pulls a

small package out of his pocket and gives it to her. “Here’s a housewarming

present for you,” he says. “It’s one of the first electronic newspapers on the mar-

ket with a roll-up display and Internet connection.” Suzy unfurls the display to

the length of a newspaper. She then pushes the “Refresh” button, after which

the latest news appears. She glances at the main headline and, with a look of

astonishment, turns the display so Frank can see it: “Suzy and Frank on their

honeymoon — automotive designer treats interior decorator to a week in Cali-

fornia’s newest light hotel,” says the headline, below which is a picture of the

two of them. Frank blushes. “My colleagues must have done that as a gag,” he

says. “Great job,” says Suzy dryly, but she then grins mischievously. Frank hesi-

tates a second, and then grabs the remote, which he uses to transform the ceil-

ing into a night sky filled with thousands of stars… � Ulrich Eberl

the flexible design of the modules, which wereeasily accommodated by the curved walls.

Supermarkets are next on the list. In a 2006pilot project, Osram equipped a Migros super-market in the Swiss canton of St. Gallen with16,000 high-performance LEDs. Employees

and customers have since reported that theyare thrilled by “the invigorating and motivatingatmosphere” in the store. The LEDs’ clear lightalso makes for a better display of merchandise,including fresh produce and meat, as thediodes emit neither infrared nor UV light.

Homeowners are now experimenting withLED modules in kitchens, bathrooms and livingrooms. “LEDs can also improve productivity inoffices by simulating daylight, thus supportingemployees’ biorhythms,” says Lex. “During theday you have a type of blue light and toward the

evening you move toward red.” The tiny spot-lights can be installed in furniture, clothing andeven in floors. In 2004, for example, VorwerkTeppiche and Infineon demonstrated a “think-ing carpet.” Such carpets can be equipped withsensors for alarm and climate control systems

— or LEDs that indicate the fastest route toemergency exits in office buildings.

But LEDs aren’t the only game in town.OLEDs — organic light emitting diodes (see Pic-tures of the Future, Fall 2003, p. 38) — are alsolikely to have a huge impact. Unlike LEDs,

OLEDs light up entire surfaces. They consist ofan actively luminescent plastic layer less than500 nanometers thick — that’s about a hun-dredth of the diameter of a human hair. Or-ganic molecules contained in the plastic layerare exposed to an electric current that causes



Siemens has developed an array of solu-tions for improving traffic control, includingthe “Ruhrpilot” for the Ruhr region and a TrafficManagement Center in Berlin (Pictures of theFuture, Spring 2006, p. 34). Here, computersanalyze data from thousands of traffic sensors;any data on traffic jams or road repairs is trans-mitted immediately to drivers via radio, mobilephone, navigation system and the Internet.

These are the first important steps towardthe 2016 scenario. Also working to realize thisvision is Dr. Christian Schwingenschlögl ofSiemens Corporate Technology (CT) in Munich,who develops new solutions for efficient com-munications networks. Radio networks are sub-jected to new burdens when cars on the roadcommunicate with one another — collecting,processing and (without the invention of a cen-tral computer) swapping data with other vehi-cles, directly or via nodes. Some applicationsdemand extremely reliable data transfer, whilefor others the priority is fast transmission rates,to ensure that vehicles following behind arewarned of road hazards in real time.

“Right now, we’re working on efficientbroadband wireless Internet connections forvehicles,” explains Schwingenschlögl. Today’sprototypes are all based on mobile WLAN tech-nology (p. 101). Researchers are currently de-veloping the efficient protocols required to en-sure reliable data transfer during the narrowtime slot when vehicles drive past one anotheror a stationary access point. Another challengeis to manage the handover when changingfrom one WLAN node, which has a range ofless than 200 meters, to the next. “We’re alsolooking into enhanced network technology forthe roadside receiver stations and new commu-nications standards,” Schwingenschlögl adds.

The IEEE international committee is cur-rently creating a WLAN standard (802.11p) forcars. From 2008, new vehicles from differentmanufacturers should therefore be able towarn each other of road hazards, opening thepossibility of dynamic self-regulation for roadtraffic. SV is already testing prototypes in coop-eration with Industrial Siemens Solutions andServices (I&S), according to Schwingenschlögl,

who anticipates very rapid progress to marketmaturity. “Downtown areas of major cities, inparticular, are ideal for this technology.”

Digital Pheromones. Also active in the fieldof car-to-car communications is Dieter Kolb,who has been working for the past two yearson software for vehicle-based capture of trafficdata. In partnership with Johannes Kepler Uni-versity and the Ars Electronica Futurelab, bothin the Austrian city of Linz, Kolb and his teamfrom CT in Munich have taken the principle ofself-organization employed by ant colonies andapplied it to road traffic. This is because cars canbe made to leave a trail of digital “pheromones”on the road, just as ants do when they secrete aspecial scent to mark routes to food (Pictures ofthe Future, Spring 2006, p. 92).

In this case, vehicles record relevant data foreach section of road, such as the time taken tocover the distance. This is then transmitted to acomputer or via mobile radio to neighboring ve-hicles, which in turn forward the information toother vehicles. In this way, each vehicle has an

Electronic guides will provide navigational

assistance and display information on museum

exhibits — here, the pointer telegraph

invented by Werner v. Siemens.

Pocket NavigatorResearchers at Siemens VDO Automotive and Siemens Corporate Technology arehelping people to navigate unfamiliar cities more efficiently, whether by car or onfoot — while providing them with a constant flow of updated information.


them to light up. OLEDs can already achieve afull range of colors if the right molecules andpolymers are used. Developers create whitelight by stacking red, green, and blue layerson top of one another. OLEDs display goodcolor rendering properties and a high level oftrue color, and, like LEDs, they are also very ef-ficient.

OLEDs’ principal benefit, however, is thatthey are thin, flat, transparent and flexible.They can be made in many shapes and sizesand applied to glass panels or flexible foils,thereby opening up completely new applica-tion possibilities. They can be used, for exam-ple, in illuminated billboards, emergency signsand as courtesy lights on stairs. Osram expertsalso believe that OLEDs will serve as new deco-rative lighting elements on walls and windows.They have potential as transparent and colorfulroom dividers, illuminated wallpaper, and flatluminescent ceiling units that emit the samecolor spectrum as the sun.

Today, OLEDs are roughly where LEDs wereat the beginning of the 1990s. Development isproceeding rapidly, however, thanks to severalcooperative projects, including the EuropeanUnion’s OLLA project and the OPAL 2008 proj-ect, which is funded by the German Ministry ofEducation and Research. Osram OS, BASF, Aix-tron, Applied Materials, Philips, other compa-nies, universities and research institutes in-volved in the project plan to cover the entire


OLED value chain, from materials to completeOLED lights. The goal is to rapidly develop thebasis for low-cost manufacturing techniquesthat will lead to marketable products. Germanyand Europe hope to become the leaders inOLED lighting systems.

Some 40 experts are working on the devel-opment and optimization of OLED light sourcesand production processes at Osram andSiemens, especially at Osram OS in Regens-burg. Although they have already built OLEDswith a lifespan of 6,000 hours, their target is atleast 10,000. The efficiency of units producedin the lab is already more than 25 lm/W, a fig-ure the researchers plan to double. They’ve alsogreatly improved OLED luminance, which iscurrently 1,000 – 1,500 candelas per squaremeter (cd/m2), or ten times higher than that ofa white piece of paper exposed to typical officelighting. Illuminated signs for emergency exits,for example, require several hundred cd/m2,while general lighting requires 1,000 – 2,000cd/m2.

The biggest challenge at the moment is todevelop production techniques for wide-areaOLED light sources of acceptable quality, relia-bility and homogeneity. If such low-cost massproduction methods can be achieved, however,residents of major cities around the globe mayone day be able to enjoy “a truly staggeringarray of lights more fabulous than anythingever dreamed of.” � Evdoxia Tsakiridou

New application areas for light-emitting diodes include office lighting systems (left) and lighting units that

lend a refined touch to modern kitchens (right). A concept car from Opel is also equipped with LEDs (center).

Organic light-emitting diodes (OLEDs) can be used in a variety of ways — for example, as area lighting units

(left), displays and signs (center) and as emergency lighting systems (right).

| Navigation Systems

Munich, 2016. Tom and Susan from theU.S. have finally gotten around to taking

that long-planned trip to Germany. They’redriving a smart car, which is fed with trafficinformation in real time. Vehicles ahead havesent out a warning of a traffic jam, giving Tomtime to follow the navigation system’s adviceand take a detour.

“That will be perfectly normal in the future,”says Dr. Hans-Gerd Krekels. “Cars will always beonline.” The challenge will be to ensure seam-less wireless connectivity to external sourcesand services. Equally complex is the job of inte-grating consumer electronics and infotainmentservices, because these develop so fast, explainsKrekels, who is in charge of product portfolioand innovation management for InfotainmentSolutions at Siemens VDO (SV) in Wetzlar,Germany. That’s why he has opted for opensoftware architecture with interfaces, whichconnects vehicles to mobile navigation andmultimedia applications. “We’re working on acompletely new multimedia development plat-form that could be ready by 2010,” Krekels adds.

| e-Government


Whether it’s dealing with tax authorities orpassport offices, for most citizens a date

with officialdom is a wearisome business. Yetthis is changing radically. Today, more andmore citizens are conducting their businesswith public authorities online. This also bene-fits administrative bodies, because it stream-lines an entire range of processes, which meanscost savings — and greater transparency. If,for example, administrative processes can beinspected online, citizens can find out at anytime what’s holding up, say, a building permit.

In the past, individual desks or depart-ments would have to wait for their turn toprocess an application, but putting this proce-dure online makes it possible for all of them towork on it in parallel. “That’s got to makethings at least twice as fast as before,” esti-mates Dr. Johannes Dotterweich, head of theSiemens e-government laboratory in Berlin.And to meet data protection requirements,the circle of people with authorized access isdefined very carefully and protected by meansof digital signatures.

The countries of the European Union are atthe forefront of this trend. A June 2006 EU Re-port about online access to the public sector

More and more public authorities are providing e-government services. Such services reduce costs, improve efficiency and make cities and states more attractive to businesses and citizens. Siemens offers a full range of IT solutions.

Online access to e-government services

offers citizens faster and more direct contact to

information — and helps make many administrative

procedures simpler and more transparent.

A Door that’s Always Open

praises Austria, Malta, Estonia, the Scandinaviancountries and the UK. Germany is likewise cred-ited with significant progress. German federalauthorities have come a long way in the wakeof the “Government Online 2005” program,especially on the ministerial level.

Making Communities More Attractive.Meanwhile, “Government Online 2010,” thefollow-up initiative, is intended to improve thedegree of networking between federal, stateand local governments, and to close any gaps.In Nuremberg, for example, the introduction ofan open SAP system for citizens has freed up agreater number of city employees to answertax-related inquiries. What’s more, it’s alsoreduced the time it takes to get a response torequests for information. The improvement insuch services also makes a city or federal statemore attractive for businesses in the process ofchoosing a location. That’s a major reason whyIT administrators in local government areincreasingly on the lookout for good onlinesolutions.

One good place to find out about all thelatest technological advances in this field is theSiemens e-government lab (Pictures of the

Future, Spring 2006, p. 94). A project in Berlinillustrates the financial benefits that such tech-nology can bring for public authorities. Back in2004, the city’s police department changed toan electronic system for processing traffic-related fines. This has resulted in more efficientstructures and has yielded considerable costsavings.

According to Dr. Karl-Heinz Weber, whoheads the project, there is another importantbenefit — an enormous saving in filing space.In the days when each case was printed onpaper, a clerk had to go through the mail eachday and file the documents away. That took upnot only time but also yards and yards of shelfspace. But now that the files are electronic,fines can be processed and issued morequickly. “There is less chance that a fine will ex-pire, which also leads to fewer appeals and bet-ter payment rates,” explains Weber.

For budgetary reasons, lots of municipalauthorities are working with solutions that arebased on existing processes and services. Tonetwork them, all the departments involvedshould be able to automatically read and fullyprocess all the various data formats. Fre-quently, however, the software in use today


Like ants, cars could soon be leaving “scenttrails” to help other vehicles avoid traffic.

Livable Megacities | Navigation Systems

overview of the current traffic situation and cantherefore select an optimal route. “We’re using aspecial simulator to look at which data we needto record, and how best to do it, in order to opti-mally inform other road users,” Kolb explains.This involves simulating traffic jams for exam-ple, to check how many vehicles need to beequipped with such a system in order to triggera self-organizing effect.

“The initial results are very encouraging,” hereports. “The use of digital pheromones cansubstantially reduce the build-up of traffic con-gestion, because drivers can switch to alterna-tive routes, with the result that traffic getsspread across the entire road network.” In Kolb’ssimulation, taking an alternative route or a cal-culated detour saves time. “But we’ll have to

Drivers approaching on the ring roadaround the old part of the city are able to checkparking availability via variable traffic signs.Equipped with an aerial and GPRS module, thedisplays receive data via mobile radio, with up-dates every minute in busy periods. “Becauseno cables had to be laid, it saved the city a lotof money,” Wendler explains. The underlyingsystem is Internet-based, which means, as JörgMortsiefer explains, that “new subscribers suchas other parking garages, the ADAC motorists’organization and even radio stations can beconnected at minimal cost.” Mortsiefer is SalesDirector at Setrix. His team has developed therequisite network technology, complete withcontrol module and gateway, which managesthe communications to the control room and

invented by Werner v. Siemens — the terminalprovides them with detailed information re-garding the device. What’s more, it also dis-plays digital comments left by other museumvisitors. One such message suggests wherethey can get the best sausage and beer…

Whereas routing systems are a way of life formany drivers, pedestrian navigation is still in itsinfancy. Instead of information on interstatehighways and one-way streets, what people onfoot or bicycles really need are digital maps ofmuch greater detail than are currently available.That’s because they want to be guided to spe-cific locations such as restaurants and ATMs.

Digital Graffiti. Dieter Kolb already has a solu-tion for museums. Together with scientistsfrom Johannes Kepler University, he has devel-oped an electronic guide for the State Museumin Linz, which makes use of “digital graffiti.”Pocket-format computers, commonly known asPDAs, steer visitors through the different ex-hibitions. They also can provide backgroundinformation in the form of text, voice, imagesand online links. “Data is assigned to specificlocations throughout the museum,” explainsKolb. In order for the electronic guide to beable to recognize any particular exhibit, themuseum visitor must first take a picture using abuilt-in camera, which the system then recog-nizes. Further information is then immediatelytransmitted to the PDA.

“Visitors can also leave their own graffiti,”says Kolb. Using this interactive solution, theycan post virtual messages and comments on aspecial server via WLAN. “Other visitors canthen view them on their PDAs, superimposedon a layout plan. These might be comments onthe exhibition or a message to meet in the mu-seum cafeteria.” Kolb is also looking at industrialapplications. “We’ve already tested the solutionat Hanover Airport with German Air Traffic Con-trol and Siemens IT Solutions and Services,” hesays. There, digital graffiti was used to guide anaircraft from the runway across the apron to astationary position. � Nikola Wohllaib

Siemens researchers are working on a powerful

network system for car-to-car communications.

Drivers in Munich have access to real-time

information on parking availability (right).

see whether things pan out in reality,” he says.The human factor is the great unknown here,and it plays a decisive role in this type ofsystem. “We’ll be going to field trials in one ortwo years, once the algorithms have been fullydeveloped.”

“In 100 meters, turn left into parking spaceNo. 98,” says the voice from the loudspeakers.The navigation system guides Tom and Susanto a free space in the parking garage of theSiemens Forum in the heart of Munich.

“It’ll be another five years or so before we’llbe able to feed information on vacant parkingspaces directly into navigation systems,” com-ments Mirko Wendler, Marketing Manager forParking Management Systems for South Ger-many. Using the technical know-how of partnerSetrix, Siemens is now operating its first everparking guidance system, in the old part ofMunich. This reference project, which has beenrunning since May 2006, covers a total of 24parking garages with 7,400 parking spaces.

controls the LCD displays. The software for theuser and web interfaces also come from Setrix,a startup in which Siemens Venture Capitalholds a 25-percent stake.

“Our vision is that everyone should be ableto check parking via the Internet before theyset off,” says Mortsiefer. Meanwhile, Wendler isworking to launch another system with 13,000parking spaces in Erlangen. The city is home tothe largest Siemens location worldwide, whichwill be connected to the system along withparking garage operators, the University Clinicand a local savings bank. An EU directive onfine particulates is likely to boost the chancesof this innovative parking guidance system,since 40 percent of traffic in cities is generatedby drivers looking for parking. “Our system cancut that significantly,” says Mortsiefer.

In the Siemens Forum, Tom and Susan aregiven a handheld terminal that serves as anavigation aid and museum guide. When di-rected at an object — say the pointer telegraph


Every morning, patients call the SoarianDisease Management System using their homephones. An interactive voice response systemidentifies callers on the basis of a code andthen asks them to provide information on theirweight and overall feeling of well-being. Someprograms may also collect information aboutblood pressure, pulse and a patient’s individualcondition. The system software automaticallyconverts the answers into computer data.Experienced nurses check the data every dayand pass on advice over the phone. “Patientsreally like the system,” says Sandra Garrison,head of the Chester County Hospital’s ChronicHeart Failure Initiative. “The system is patient-friendly, and patients like being able to ask anurse questions at any time.”

Keeping an Eye on Patient Health. One ofthe fastest-growing chronic illnesses is dia-betes. To reduce the costs associated withtreatment, the British National Health Services(NHS) established a national diabetes networkin 1999. The key elements for dealing with dia-betes are prevention and continual monitoring.For example, an eye examination can revealdiabetic retinopathy, which if left untreated cancause blindness. Siemens established a surveyprocedure for diabetics in its EU Tosca project(Pictures of the Future, Spring 2003, p. 69).Studies have shown that treatment at an early

Participants in the Fish ’n Steps game carry a

pedometer. The more they move, the healthier

the fish in the virtual aquarium on the computer

screen become.

stage can prevent 60 to 70 percent of all casesof blindness caused by diabetic retinopathy.

In Scotland, experts predict that the numberof people with diabetes will double from fourto eight percent of the population between2006 and 2015, and that more than one in tenpeople affected by the illness will contractdiabetic retinopathy.

In response, Scotland assumed a pioneeringrole in 2006 by introducing the first-ever test todetermine how many of its diabetics are devel-oping diabetic retinopathy. Siemens MedicalSolutions acted as a partner in this project,which involved setting up 72 cameras to per-form examinations throughout Scotland. Theresulting data was collated by qualified person-nel and sent to five regional centers for analysis.The Soarian Integrated Care platform was usedto carry out all processes, from generating andsending letters to some 300,000 patients tomanaging appointments and evaluating theresults. “Without the software we would never

their immediate surroundings. They then sendthe images, along with a voice message onhow they feel, to the computer.

Both patient and doctor (or nurse) have ac-cess to the data, which enables participants toimmediately identify any aspect of a patient’slifestyle that’s detrimental to his or her health.The system, which can be seamlessly inte-grated into software such as Soarian DiseaseManagement, is being tested for a period ofthree months on a group of 80 to 100 patientsat a diabetes center in New Jersey. The systemcould also be used to monitor other illnesses,such as chronic cardiac insufficiency.

Feeding on Movement. One of Mamykina’scolleagues at SCR, Dr. James Lin, handles theprevention side of the equation. “Most patientsare not able to change their lifestyles by, for ex-ample, exercising more,” says Lin. But clinicalstudies show that 10,000 steps a day corre-spond to an active lifestyle. Taking a cue from

have been able to manage so many patients,”says project manager Andrea Schulz fromSiemens.

Lena Mamykina from Siemens CorporateResearch (SCR) in Princeton, New Jersey, alsoplans to use telemedicine to improve diabetics’quality of life. To help doctors give patientssensible advice, she pinpoints direct connec-tions between a diabetic’s lifestyle and his orher blood sugar levels. In an earlier project(Pictures of the Future, Spring 2005, p. 58),Mamykina networked the home appliances ofelderly people using sensors connected to alaptop. She was thus able to register every tripto the refrigerator at night, and point out to thepatients the relationship between these snacksand their high blood sugar levels.

“Today, however, people in their late 30s arealready being diagnosed with Type II diabetes,”says Mamykina. These people lead active pro-fessional lives, and they also spend a lot of timeoutside the house. To ensure that such patientsreceive individualized treatment, Mamykinaworked with Prof. Beth Mynatt from the Geor-gia Institute of Technology to develop an inte-grated communication platform. Patientsmeasure their blood sugar levels before andafter every meal. The data is sent automaticallyvia Bluetooth to a cell phone the patientcarries, and from there to a central computer.Patients also use cell phones to take pictures of

the Tamagotchi virtual pets that were popular afew years ago, Lin developed a computer gamecalled “Fish ‘n Steps.” The fish in a virtual aquar-ium are “fed” when their owners move aroundregularly. If they walk less, they put their fish atrisk of dying. Lin tested his concept using 19 ofhis colleagues from SCR as subjects.

Each participant was given a pedometerthat he or she had to carry around constantlyfor 14 weeks. If the participants took moresteps than their preset target, their fish grew. Ifthey failed to reach their target, their fishshrank, complained loudly, and in some casesdied. Lin also studied the effects of peer pres-sure by placing four participants’ fish in thesame aquarium. If one of the fish didn’t growfor a week, the water got murky. “This enabledus to get more people moving than was thecase with other studies — and our success wasindependent of age or gender,” says Lin, who issure that Fish ’n Steps can become a successfulproduct. “It’s an interesting approach that we’reobserving closely,” says Nicole Detambel, headof the “10,000 Steps” project at Siemens HealthInsurance in Munich. More than 30,000 of theinsurance company’s customers have alreadybeen given pedometers and are taking part inthe project. Unlike Fish ‘n Steps, the number ofsteps taken here is translated into a virtual dis-tance that the participant covers on a map onthe Internet. � Michael Lang

Heart failure patients can send pulse and bloodpressure measurements to a hospital.

Livable Megacities | Telemedicine


People who live in big cities often don’t getenough exercise. Chronic illnesses are in-

creasing, and health costs are skyrocketing as aresult. “There’s a whole range of measures wecan use to reduce health care costs, whileimproving patients’ quality of life,” says MichaelMankopf from Siemens Medical Solutions.Such measures include prevention programsoperated by health insurance companies andmedical checkups of chronically ill patients.Such examinations can be organized on abroad scale with the help of Siemens’ SoarianIntegrated Care software, for example.

In addition, self-monitoring can reducecosts, as patients can be continually cared for

So-called diseases of civilization, such as diabetes andheart ailments, are on the rise, especially in cities.Telemedicine solutions and Internet-based informationplatforms can help patients stay out of the hospital.

Happy Fish —Healthy Patients

at home. “Here, it’s not the individual measure-ments that are crucial; instead, it’s measure-ment trends that enable doctors to recognize adeterioration in a patient’s health at its onset,”says Alan Barbell, product manager for theSoarian Disease Management system.

For example, based on Siemens’ telemedi-cine solution, patients suffering from chronicheart failure are being cared for at home byChester County Hospital, in Pennsylvania. Staffmembers can intervene early on if patients re-port worsening symptoms such as weight gain,swelling in their feet, or shortness of breath.Early intervention often prevents the need forvisits to the emergency ward or hospitalization.

doesn’t permit this. To get around this problemauthorities are increasingly turning to open for-mats and standards, such as XML and open-source software. Using XML-based formats pro-vides another advantage: The data can also beexchanged with small, mobile devices such ascell phones or multimedia devices. “That way,authorities can provide forms online for a vari-ety of devices and even for mobile applications,which also makes it possible to query an incor-rectly completed form by means of a short textmessage to a cell phone,” explains Dr. JörgHeuer, who heads Service Infrastructure andMultimedia Services at Siemens CorporateTechnology.

Chipcard Access. Guaranteeing data protec-tion requires the use of smartcards and read-ers. The use of intelligent chipcards is verymuch on the increase, as evidenced by the es-tablishment of a trust center, in compliancewith legislation on the use of digital signatures,for the German Pension Insurance Fund. Today,roughly 54,000 employees use the Siemenssystem, which features multifunctional chip-cards for access control, logging workinghours, and the digital signature of documents,thus enabling fast and efficient electronic busi-ness processes. And that’s not all. Siemens em-ployees can log onto the system with theircompany ID card and obtain encrypted accessto their personal pension plan. There are alsosimilar IT solutions available for notary’s of-fices, the tax authorities, real-estate recordingoffices; for passports, ID cards, health insur-ance and social security; for emergency man-agement, purchasing rail tickets — even forpaying parking fines.

PPPs (public-private partnerships) are oneoption for public-sector agencies that are un-willing to carry the entire capital expenditurefor the new technology. Examples of this formof funding in Germany include Herkules, a co-operation project between the military and aconsortium of Siemens and IBM. The projecthas a volume of approximately 7.1 billion eurosand a duration of ten years. Thanks toHerkules, the armed forces’ computer centers,PCs, software, applications, telephones, andvoice and data networks will be up to the verylatest technical standards. Siemens is responsi-ble for the modernization and operation of thedecentralized systems at more than 1,500army locations in Germany, comprising some140,000 PCs, 7,000 servers, 300,000 fixed-lineand 15,000 cell phones — as well as the man-agement of local and national voice and datanetworks. It is the largest contract ever securedby Siemens and also the largest PPP project inall of Europe. � Martin Arnold

In Brief

� Cities are attractive because they provide

inhabitants with a wealth of opportunities for

realizing their dreams. The criteria that make a

city worth living in include: low levels of crime

and pollution, plenty of job opportunities and

good public transport for high mobility. Sie-

mens is implementing solutions for cities on

all continents, including London, São Paulo,

Moscow, St. Petersburg and Chicago. (p. 11,

13, 14, 16, 20, 22)

� In a research project backed by Siemens,

522 decision-makers from 25 of world’s largest

cities provided detailed information on the

greatest challenges they face. Solving traffic

problems has by far the top priority. Although

environmental issues also play a major role,

they sometimes take a back seat to economic

growth in expanding cities. (p. 14)

� Security is a major factor affecting the sub-

jective quality of life in cities. Siemens offers

video surveillance solutions for train stations,

airports and streets. Siemens technology has,

for example, made the port of Rotterdam one

of the world’s safest. (p. 25)

� Noise is irritating and can easily make life in

cities unbearable. Not only does Siemens re-

duce the noise emissions of power plants to a

tolerable level, it also uses various techniques

to make subways, diesel locomotives and high-

speed trains very quiet. (p. 32)

� In the future, electric light in cities will

increasingly be provided by light-emitting

diodes (LED) that are particularly energy-

efficient and durable. Osram is also develop-

ing organic light-emitting diodes (OLED), and

both technologies could one day revolutionize

general lighting. (p. 34)

� Navigation systems are becoming a part of

everyday life. Not only do they steer drivers to

unoccupied parking spaces, they also guide

visitors through museums. (p. 39)

� e-government can simplify public adminis-

tration and make it more citizen-friendly.

Siemens is implementing numerous solutions

for authorities and municipalities. (p. 41)

PEOPLE:

Urban Development:

Dr. Willfried Wienholt

[email protected]

Brazil:

Wagner Lotito, [email protected]

Russia:

Alexey Grigoriev

[email protected]

London:

Rob Simpson, [email protected]

Security:

Urs Boller, SBT, [email protected]

Biometrics:

Gerd Hribernig, SIS

[email protected]

Noise:

Holger Ennes, PG

[email protected]

Friedrich Moninger, TS

[email protected]

Light:

Markus Rademacher, Osram

[email protected]

Navigation:

Dr. Hans-Gerd Krekels, SV

[email protected]

Dieter Kolb, CT, [email protected]

Homecare:

Michael Mankopf, Med

[email protected]

Lena Mamykina, SCR

[email protected]

Household appliances:

Monica Krenz

[email protected]

Prof. George Hazel, MRC McLean Hazel:

[email protected]

LINKS:

LED technology and applications:

www.osram-os.com/showroom

Megacity report:

www.siemens.com/megacities

LITERATURE:

George Hazel, Roger Parry,

Making Cities Work, Academy Press (2004)

Peter Hall, Cities of Tomorrow,

Blackwell Publishers (2002)

Livable Megacities | Household Appliances


Buyers of new household appliances expecttheir purchases to be effective, user-

friendly and to have innovative features. En-ergy efficiency is also an increasingly importantfactor. In response to this demand, manufac-turers are now offering a growing array ofresource-saving products. Bosch und SiemensHausgeräte GmbH (BSH), for example, hasdeveloped a dishwasher fitted with the aqua-Sensor III, which regularly monitors water tur-bidity and adjusts the amount of water and thewashing time accordingly. That gets dishessparkling and saves water at the same time.

Many other appliances also have smartfunctions. A number of washing machinesfrom Siemens feature load sensors that usetwo opposing magnets to weigh the laundry inthe drum, and then recommend an appropriateamount of water and detergent. Back in 1970,a washing machine used 200 liters of water —enough to fill a bathtub — for a single laundryload of five kilograms. Today that figure is just43 liters for six kilograms.

Now, major savings can be realized in thekitchen. Induction cooking surfaces heat upcookware without becoming hot themselves,which means they’re much quicker and moreefficient than conventional ranges. They can

grated household management system, a userwill, for instance, be able to turn down theheating and switch off the lights and stovewith a single command when leaving thehouse. The technology is likely to be used invery different ways from country to country,however. “In the U.S., systems like this will bemarketed mainly with convenience in mind,whereas the focus in Germany is more likely tobe on safety aspects,” explains Wissmann.

Meanwhile, a new refrigerator from Siemensoffers performance that benefits all users. Itstores perishable food items at temperaturesnear zero degrees Celsius, so food items suchas fish, meat and dairy products stay fresh forup to three times longer. Siemens’ vitaFreshtechnology delays chemical decompositionprocesses and more effectively preservesnutrients and aromas. And for temperature-sensitive foods like fruits and vegetables, thefridge has compartments that are kept athigher temperatures and a higher humidity

heat two liters of water from 15 to 90 degreesCelsius in 4.7 minutes, compared to the 9.9minutes taken by a glass-ceramic cooktop. Andthanks in part to new insulation technologyand more effective compressors, the powerconsumption of modern refrigerators has beencut by as much as 75 percent since 1990.

Elevator Oven. Other innovations are design-ed with ergonomics in mind. The glass-ceramicfloor of the wall-mounted liftMatic ovenlaunched by Siemens in 2006, for example,serves as a combination oven door and a bak-ing tray. It opens downward, giving users easyaccess to roasts or cakes from three sides. TheliftMatic also efficiently exploits the fact thathot air rises, so the oven interior stays warmlonger. Household chores are also becomingeasier thanks to oven models that break downorganic residues into water and carbon dioxideat temperatures of up to 500 degrees Celsius.Inorganic residues are turned to ash that cansimply be wiped away with a cloth. Kitchensurroundings are protected from high tempera-tures by means of multiple layers of glass,special insulation mats and a locking system.

Even though the number of senior citizensliving in their own homes is expected to rise in

the future, demographic development is notthe only reason why household appliances arebecoming more user-friendly. Klaus Wissmannand his team at the User Interface Design Cen-ter at Siemens Corporate Technology createeasy-to-use products and test their ease of op-eration. “Younger people also appreciate thingsthat make their lives easier,” Wissmann reports.“A household appliance needs to be efficientand user-friendly for consumers of any age.”Washing machines, to name one example, willin the future be able to read RFID labels onclothing to determine what kind of garments,and how many, are in the drum. A black sock ina load of white laundry will be recognized im-mediately, and the machine will alert the user.If all items are compatible, the machine auto-matically selects a suitable program and theright amounts of water and detergent.

Many home appliances already communi-cate with users, some via the Internet. With acell phone, it’s now possible to find out if arange has been left on accidentally. And,thanks to serve@Home technology (Pictures ofthe Future, Spring 2004, p. 31), it can evenbe switched off remotely. The resource-con-serving networking of home appliances will bestandard in the future. With the help of an inte-

Even with rapidly advancing technology, housework will still be part of everyday life in the future. With smart appliances, however, household chores will be much easier. Innovations from Siemens help to save energy and protect the environment.

In the Siemens User Interface Design Center, experts

from Corporate Technology test the user-friendliness

of household appliances. Ideally, the appliances

should be simple to operate for users of any age.

Home Smart Home

level. In a few years, it could also be possibleto keep food in a special protective interior at-mosphere — which will preserve food vitamincontent while requiring fewer shopping trips.

In the past, the kitchen mainly served apractical purpose. Today it is increasingly seenas a place of social interaction. But whenfriends and families meet to cook, eat andspend time together in the kitchen, they don’twant the dishwasher droning for hours like anold fashioned air conditioner. In response tothe importance of low noise levels, developershave come up with dishwashers with quiet-closing doors that run at a volume of only 42decibels — hardly above a whisper. And if thehousehold appliances of tomorrow are so effi-cient, energy-saving and user-friendly, thenwhy not make them fun to operate, too? Avisionary idea — a refrigerator equipped withan LCD monitor and loudspeakers for watchingmovies and listening to music in the kitchen —is already reality. � Dagmar Braun

Siemens researcher Robert Rauschenberger is looking into the brains of test subjects.In cooperation with Harvard University and the University of Utrecht, he’s using anMR tomograph to monitor cognitive phenomena. Although his work is limited to basic research today, it could have practical applications in the not-too-distant future.


A 3D image of the brain. The orange area is the lateral

occipital complex (LOC), which is important for recog-

nizing shapes. Robert Rauschenberger (right) and his

partners are using MR imaging to study the LOC.

Until recently, the human brain, with itscomplex matrix of billions of nerve cells,

was largely inaccessible for scientific inquiry,and researchers had no alternative but to useindirect means to determine how human be-ings are able to perceive their surroundings,think and learn.

A new method introduced a few years ago,however, is making it possible to show how thebrain works while it is processing our sensoryimpressions. Known as functional magneticresonance imaging, fMRI “enables us to liter-ally watch the brain while it’s thinking,” reportsDr. Robert Rauschenberger, a cognitive psy-chologist at Siemens Corporate Research inPrinceton, New Jersey. Rauschenberger is partof a team that also includes Prof. Frans Ver-straten of the Helmholtz Institute at the Univer-

to show for the first time which areas of thebrain are active during which cognitiveprocesses, but also how they function.”

“The results are quite amazing,” addsRauschenberger. “We have demonstrated, forinstance, that there is an unconscious flow ofinformation between brain cells and the eyes.”The findings of this basic research could lead tothe development of new technologies and sys-tems that would help make people aware ofthings they might otherwise fail to notice.

Several American companies are planningto market new kinds of lie detectors that usefunctional magnetic resonance imaging to de-termine the veracity of statements by measur-ing brain activity. However, experts doubt thatthis method will be ready for practical use inthe next few years. It is unclear, for example, if

functional MRI can accurately identify suspi-cious persons who are not aware of havingcommitted any wrongdoing or who are patho-logical liars. Furthermore, lie detector tests areinfluenced by a large number of factors. “Al-though our experiments are similarly complex,they are conducted under controlled condi-tions and are therefore reliable,” explainsRauschenberger.

Visual Feedback. Using a Siemens tomo-graph with a magnetic field strength of threeTeslas, Rauschenberger and Carlson viewedtest subjects’ brain reactions to a variety of im-ages. Previous tests with words that flashed for30 milliseconds showed that these not con-sciously perceived stimuli are in fact registeredby the brain. This is proved by a measurablesignal that the brain returns to the eye.

These results led scientists to believe that itmight be possible to use subliminal messages tomanipulate cinema audiences to buy certainproducts. “But it doesn’t work that way,” says

Research Cooperation | Functional MR Imaging


sity of Utrecht, which funds the project, andTom Carlson of Harvard University in Cam-bridge, Massachusetts.

Functional magnetic resonance imaging tech-nology examines brain metabolism and super-imposes the results on MR images to map areasof increased brain activity. Firing neurons needmore oxygen, which is why more blood flowsinto areas that are active. In contrast to bloodwith low oxygen content, the increased con-centration of oxygen-rich blood triggers achange in the signal of the tomograph’s mag-netic field. The value actually being measuredis the amount of iron in the hemoglobin of thered blood cells.

“With a resolution of about one cubic mil-limeter, we can precisely delineate areas of ac-tivity,” Carlson explains. “Not only were we able

activity at the same time,” says Carlson. Al-though it takes several seconds for the blood toflow through the brain, the process can be pre-cisely tracked if the chronological sequence ofthe images is known.

Researchers asked the test subjects to saywhich of the square’s corners was missing. Theycouldn’t provide the answer, though, becausethe image was masked too quickly. “That provesthey weren’t consciously aware of the square,”Rauschenberger explains. “As we can see fromthe signal, the sensory impression is first trans-mitted to the brain. The brain then asks for con-firmation — which it doesn’t receive, becausethe image has already been masked by a newsensory impression.”

In the fMRI the signals for the square andthe masking stimulus are usually distinct. Butwhy does the masking impression cause thesquare to vanish from people’s memories?“That was the question we wanted to findanswers to,” recalls Rauschenberger. Is it be-cause the masking stimulus deletes the impres-

Psychological Science will soon publish newfindings from the experiments Rauschenbergerconducted together with Carlson and Dutch psy-chologist Verstraten. The results demonstratethat the brain can’t be fooled. Although theconscious mind can be deceived, neurologicalprocesses are objectively displayed by the fMRI.“I myself was one of the test subjects,” revealsRauschenberger. “And although I knew exactlyhow the test would proceed, my fMRI values areexactly the same as those of all the other testsubjects. Even I couldn’t manipulate the result.”

Better Hearing Aids. While Rauschenberger’sresearch is still at a very basic stage, it’s openingup prospects for concrete applications. BecausefMRI can be used to determine which decisionspeople make — and yield insights into how theyfeel while making them — the technology couldbe used to conduct studies of people’s brandawareness. This could be done, for example, byimaging the amygdaloid nucleus, which is re-sponsible for emotional reactions.

Rauschenberger. Only under very specific con-ditions can such messages trigger desires, andit’s almost impossible to steer those desires to-ward a specific brand. “Instead of words, weshowed our test subjects squares with a cornermissing,” says Rauschenberger. Such shapesgenerate simpler patterns in the brain than isthe case with words, which also create associa-tions and bring back memories that can set offa veritable shower of sparks in a functional MRI.

As with the experiment using words, testsubjects viewing a square were shown an im-age for about 30 milliseconds. After a pause,this was followed by a stimulus that lasted for30 to 100 milliseconds and masked the firstimpression. Because the subjects were lying in-side an MR tomograph for the entire duration ofthe test, “we were able to measure their brain

sion of the square, or because this informationis no longer accessible to the conscious mind— even though it’s still stored in the brain?

To find the answer to the puzzle, Rauschen-berger and Carlson decided to change the ex-periment. Following the masking stimulus,they once again showed the square with thesame corner missing. If the first sensory im-pression was still stored in the brain, the sec-ond signal would be weaker because the nervestimulus would be repeated. “But the signal re-mains undiminished, as if the first square hadnever existed in the first place,” Rauschen-berger says. According to currently acceptedtheory, the brain processes the second signalcompletely independently from the first, whichmeans the masking stimulus entirely deletesthe first sensory impression from the brain.

Comparisons of fMRI images would also pro-vide an objective means of determiningwhether test subjects are consciously makingfalse statements. And Siemens would stand tobenefit from the precise brain-visualizationmethod in a variety of ways.

Hearing aids are a good example. Elderlypeople often find it difficult to adjust to the sen-sory impressions that are created by a newhearing aid, whereas younger people usuallyhave fewer problems in this regard. fMRI couldbe used in the future to discover if this is a resultof cognitive phenomena — or of physiologicalfactors that change with age. “The results ofsuch a study could help us with the develop-ment of improved hearing aids for older peo-ple,” explains Rauschenberger.


Watching Thoughts

50 The Disease MachineMolecular medicine holds the promise of early disease detection and personalized treatment.

54 The Right Mix Siemens is bringing together thepreviously separate worlds of lab-oratory data and clinical imaging.

57 Nipping Disease in the Bud Biomarkers and increasingly sensi-tive imaging methods are detectingdiseases before symptoms occur.

62 Zeroing in on Cancer Aided by magnetic fields,nanoparticles zero in on tumors,delivering drugs or lethal heat.

68 Detecting DiseasesInterview with Prof. Detlev Ganten, Chairman of the Board of Charité Hospital in Berlin.

70 Digging out the DataNew knowledge portals are providing doctors with individual therapy recommendations.

74 Tomorrow’s TreatmentsInterview with Prof. RalphWeissleder, director of the Centerfor Molecular Imaging Research atMassachusetts General Hospital.

Highlights

2020Genetic predisposition testing and a protein-

based blood test have shown that Eduardo

might have colon cancer. During a scan, mol-

ecules that bind only to cancer cells reveal

a small growth. An endoscope equipped

with microscopic sensors performs a virtual

biopsy, confirming that the growth is can-

cerous. Fluorescent molecules in the tumor

indicate exactly which cells are cancerous,

allowing a specialist to safely remove them.


Eduardo has colon cancer. But in 2020 such a diagnosis isfar from threatening. Genetic screening has encouragedfrequent blood testing, which has resulted in early identi-fication of his tumor. Molecular imaging agents allow thetiny tumor to be perfectly visualized on a scanner. Minia-turization and knowledge-based diagnostics make avirtual biopsy possible. And on-the-spot micro-surgicalintervention ensures that no cancer cells are left behind.

Microscopic Miracles

Molecular Medicine | Scenario 2020

I’m lucky. I won’t die. In fact, I won’t evenhave to miss a single episode of my favorite

shows. It all started with an automatically-gener-

ated priority e-mail that appeared in the mar-gin of my 3D virtual immersion TV. As usual, Iwas slouching in my media room shovelingdown a bowl of my favorite vanilla ice creamand feeling like the star of the evening inter-active quiz shows, when I paused to open themessage.


Imagine traveling down a moonless highwaywith no way of knowing what was on either

side of the road. Out there, in the distance,would be some three billion towns and roadsidecrossings; yet only a few of them would havenames. The rest would be too silent and face-less to even notice. If your job was to find all thenameless towns and figure out what was goingon in each of them, you would be confrontingan information challenge equivalent to under-standing the human genome — the compre-hensive genetic instruction manual found ineach cell of our bodies.

“Understanding the human genome — find-ing out the names of all of those towns andwhat they mean for us — will open the door topersonalized medicine,” says Tony Bihl, ChiefExecutive Officer of Siemens Medical SolutionsDiagnostics in Tarrytown, New York. “It willmean early detection of disease, treatment withdrugs that match a patient’s individual needs,follow-up with imaging systems that track —and help to adjust — treatment response overtime, and advanced information technologythat optimizes in vitro and in vivo technologiesevery step of the way.

Molecular medicine will open the door to early

detection of diseases and individualized treatment

based on each person’s unique genetic fingerprint.

People of all ages will benefit.

The “towns” in such a journey might be thebase pairs of adenine and thymine, or guanineand cytosine, for instance, that connect thesugar phosphate backbones of the double helixout of which our 46 chromosomes are made. Orthey could be “cities” — groups of base pairsotherwise known as genes — capable of form-ing proteins. Today, most of the towns andcities that have been identified look like roughneighborhoods — places where tough guys likecystic fibrosis and sickle cell anemia hang out.Yet they are the ones we can see as we drivealong. The rest are yet to be discovered.


Molecular Medicine | Scenario 2020 | Trends

The potential benefits ofmolecular medicine areimmense. At the top ofthe list is the promise ofearly disease detectionand treatments opti-mized for each patient.Getting from here tothere will take us on a journey through thegenome and require theintegration of colossalamounts of data as weseek to understand andmanage the mechanismsof disease.

“Dear Eduardo,” it read, “A recently estab-lished national healthcare database has match-ed your family history of colon cancer withyour lifetime Electronic Patient Record. TheNational Health Service suggests a visit to oneof the following practitioners in your area.These healthcare professionals are authorizedto offer a newly approved genetic predis-position test for colon cancer. For your conven-ience, their addresses have already been down-loaded into your vehicle’s navigation system.For details, click…Thank you.”

I didn’t need any directions to find Dr.Shackleton’s office. He’s my GP and he lives justa few blocks from my high-rise. “Yes, Ed,” hewas saying, “This is one heck of a nifty test.They managed to squeeze the ‘quivalent of anentire diagnostic lab into this little cartridge.We’ll have ya profiled in just a sec.”

Pretty cool, I thought, as I watched a tiny labcard loaded with a few drops of my blood dis-appear into the reader on the spotless counter-top beneath a restored oil painting of aschooner breaking dramatically through wind-swept waves. Shackleton brushed my Health-e-Card against the machine, allowing the readerto access my EPR. After a few minutes he gaveme the news.

“Ed,” he said, “No cause for alarm. But theDNA test shows that you have a colon cancerpredisposition gene. The test compared yourpersonal medical data — lab tests, family his-tory — with data from millions of other pa-tients, and based on the outcomes of theirfiles, it calculated your lifetime risk. All in all,the test suggests that you should be screenedfor colon cancer. So with your permission I’lldraw a little more blood and we’ll do a massspectrometric test.”

I’ve since done a little research on thesetests and found that what they do is to analyzethe levels of disease-related proteins in blood— in this case proteins specifically produced bycolon cancer cells.

A few days later an e-mail from Shackleton’soffice confirmed that my spectroscopic profilehad “revealed an expression level indicative ofcolon cancer.” It said that the data, which hadbeen added to my EPR, had been compared toa population database, and that it correlatedwith a high probability of cancer. “Dr. Shackle-ton recommends an MR/PET molecular imagingscan. We have scheduled an appointment foryou at…”

“O.K. No need to worry,” I told myself as Iturned down the volume on a late night quizshow and scooped out the final, delectablespoonful of vanilla-flavored ice cream from acarton. “All they’ve found so far are probabilitylevels. Keep cool.”

But when the date for the imaging testrolled around, I have to admit that I was morethan a little nervous. The scan was to takeplace at a major hospital, and my interven-tional radiologist, Dr. Hyde, told me that if theyfound “any immediately resectable tumor, theywould take it out on the spot.”

Before going into the scanner, a techniciangave me an injection of a PET tracer — a short-lived radioactive substance attached to amolecule that binds only to cancer cells. Themolecule also had a fluorescent element. “Ifyou have any cancer cells anywhere in yourbody, this tracer will be absorbed by them andthe scanner will see where they are,” sheexplained. “Then, if you need surgery, we’ll getan endoscope in there. A microscope at the tipof the endoscope will be able to see every lastcancer cell because they’ll fluoresce, and Dr.Hyde is an expert in getting them out.”

After that I lay down and tried not to thinkabout what was going on as the big scannerhummed along the length of my entire body.

From that point on my memories aresketchy to say the least. I understand that, asexpected, the scan detected a small tumor inmy upper colon, at which point I was given apowerful sedative. A computer-aided diagnos-tic program then quantified the precise dimen-sions of the lesion and passed them on toanother program to support Dr. Hyde duringtreatment.

Dr. Hyde explained later that a remotelycontrolled endoscope was threaded into mycolon and guided to the tumor using real timemagnetic resonance. Equipped with a recently-approved combination of molecular sensorsand tools, the endoscope used multiple wave-lengths of light as well as a protein array “lab-on-the-tip-of-a-needle” to conduct an in vivobiopsy of the tumor.

Finally, guided by Dr. Hyde, a microscopicvisual attachment sensitive to the infrared glowof the cancer cells directed a laser at the tip ofthe catheter to remove the lesion down to thelast cancer cell with the help of an aspirator.

When I swam up out of sedation, Dr. Hydewas all smiles. He explained that the in vivobiopsy had provided information on my tumor’scharacteristics and that the prognosis, particu-larly because of early detection and treatment,looked great.

“For all practical purposes, you’re cured,” hesaid. “All you’ll have to do is participate in afollow-up screening program and watch whatyou eat!”

“Sure, doc,” I said with genuine gratitude.But I was already dreaming about my nextcarton of vanilla-flavored ice cream.

� Arthur F. Pease

Dissecting the DiseaseMachine


Outline of tomorrow’s

molecular-based health-

care. (1) Fluid analysis.

(2) In vitro tests indicate

disease markers.

(3) PET/CT scan localizes and characterizes

the abnormality. (4) Data integration. Thanks

to knowledge-based IT, doctors determine

the ideal combination of medical treatment.

(5, 6) Follow-up with in vitro and in vivo tests

indicating steadily diminishing concentrations

of disease biomarkers and shrinking tumors.

A combination of ultrasound and laboratorytests may obviate liver biopsies in the future.

levels than normal, and we have developed anFDA-approved test that detects these.” TheOncogene Science Group has also developedtests to measure three other cancer-relatedproteins, making Siemens Medical SolutionsDiagnostics the only company to have a panelof four oncoproteins. Several pharmaceuticalcompanies are developing targeted therapiesto address these oncoproteins, thus openingthe door to personalized medicine for cancerpatients.

Such tests exemplify the promise of molecu-lar medicine. Although still lacking the sensitivityto detect early-stage breast tumors — a develop-ment that is now in the pipeline — the HER-2test provides a simple, painless way of detect-ing whether therapy is working. “This is veryimportant, both from a medical as well as aneconomic point of view, because until recently,the best feedback came from biopsies,” saysDavid Hickey, Diagnostics unit Vice President forGlobal Strategic Marketing. “Using simple blood-based biomarkers to help clinicians guide ex-pensive therapy can make a real difference inoptimizing the economics of healthcare.”

The direct result of our knowledge of what anormal human genome looks like — and theproteins its 30,000 to 40,000 genes expressand do not express — the HER-2 test is one ofthe first of a new class of products that willhelp to avoid expensive biopsies while provid-ing feedback as to whether medical treatment— which can run to tens of thousands of dol-lars per year per patient — is working or not.

What’s more, the HER-2 biomarker is on thecusp of the nascent connection between in vivoand in vitro molecular diagnostics. At Massachu-setts General Hospital (MGH) in Boston, for in-stance, researchers are working with Siemens toimage HER-2 levels in mice by labeling Herceptin— the medication often used in treating HER-2-related breast cancer — with a fluorochromelabel. The labeled Herceptin binds to the HER-2,allowing its level and location to be visuallytracked in vivo since it is produced by the tumorand is therefore found at its highest concentra-

tion there. “The technology is potentially trans-ferable to humans and could be valuable inmonitoring the adequacy of therapy,” says Dr.Umar Mahmood, associate professor of radiol-ogy at Harvard Medical School and director ofthe Mouse Imaging Program at MGH’s Center forMolecular Imaging.

Other molecular tests that join in vitro within vivo technologies are also on the horizon.For instance, Diagnostics unit researchers areexcited about the potential for a revolutionaryconvergence between the company’s in vitrobiomarkers that assess the status of the liverwith regard to the hepatitis B and C viruses(HBV and HCV) and the use of ultrasound.Worldwide, hundreds of millions of people areinfected with HBV and HCV, which can be lifethreatening because chronic infection can leadto liver fibrosis and cancer.

Furthermore, fatty liver disease, an increas-ingly common diet-related illness, has many ofthe same disease characteristics. Yet today, theonly way of monitoring these conditions is bymeans of biopsies. “But,” says David Okrongly,PhD, Global Head of the Diagnostics unit’s Mol-ecular Diagnostics Business, “we’ve developedthree tests that measure different markers ofliver fibrosis. We’ve found that ultrasound tech-niques can be useful in evaluating liver elastic-

ity, which changes as liver disease progresses.Our initial studies have shown that in the nearfuture, physicians may be able to use a combi-nation of ultrasound and biochemical stagingto monitor patients with liver disease, andthereby decrease or eliminate the need for abiopsy.” Okrongly adds that the liver fibrosismarkers, which are now being clinically evalu-ated, are not yet commercially available.

Disease monitoring and staging are alsoadvancing rapidly through the use of magneticresonance (MR) imaging, positron emission to-mography (PET), and single photon emissioncomputed tomography (SPECT), all of whichare being used to visualize molecular processesthrough the use of agents that zero in on diseasemechanisms. In MR, scientists are concentrat-ing on the development of iron oxide nanopar-ticles — and are opening up remarkable newareas of medicine in the process. For instance,researchers have capitalized on the fact thatiron oxide molecules (which return a signal in amagnetic field) are naturally absorbed by mono-cytes — white blood cells that are part of theimmune system.

With this in mind, the researchers have de-termined that in some cases of narrowing ofthe arteries, the major problem is an inflamma-tion. “We can see this with MR because mag-netically labeled monocytes are clearly homingin on these areas,” says Dr. Robert Krieg, direc-tor of molecular magnetic imaging at SiemensMed. “This is a huge new area that could havetremendous importance in terms of the selec-tion of medications used in the treatment ofcardiovascular disease.”

Magnetic nanoparticles are also being usedto determine if cancers have spread beyond aninitial site — one of the primary questionsdoctors want to answer before deciding on acourse of treatment. For instance, in breast and

4 5 6


Molecular Medicine | Trends

systems (see p. 62) to clinical ultrasound CT,MR and positron emission tomography (PET)scanning. Furthermore, through its Soarian in-tegrated hospital software platform, syngo uni-versal interface, and collective idea machinepopulated by thousands of scientists and soft-ware specialists, Siemens offers the IT capabili-ties to merge the in vitro world of lab tests withthe in vivo world of imaging in medicallymeaningful and synergistic ways that are set toimprove workflows and cut healthcare costs.

Fundamental to Siemens’ vision of a full spec-trum of synergistic diagnostic services is a focuson the biology of disease. “Understanding whatis happening on a molecular level, how diseaseactually starts, how genes commence a muta-tion process, express certain proteins, influenceother cells, and initiate a tumor or trigger an-other disease will allow us to develop in vitrodiagnostic tests and molecular imaging proce-dures to manage these processes,” says MichaelReitermann, President of Siemens MedicalSolutions’ Molecular Imaging (MI) Division, inHoffman Estates, Illinois. Like Bihl, Reinhardtand others, he shares the view that what ismost exciting about this process is the promise

of earlier and earlier disease detection “Thesooner we detect disease, the easier and lesscostly it is to treat,” he says.

Blood-Based Cancer Tests. For experts inmolecular imaging like Reitermann, the processof early disease detection begins in places suchas Med MI’s recently expanded R&D facility inLos Angeles, which has received FDA approvalto start clinical trials on a new imaging bio-marker for Alzheimer’s disease. A biomarker is aprotein found in blood, urine or tissue samplesthat can be used to develop diagnostic tests forspecific diseases. The biomarker’s location andactivity can be tracked using PET scanning.

Developments in early disease detection arealso in full swing at the new Diagnostics unit’sOncogene Science Biomarker Group, in Cam-bridge, Massachusetts, where researchers arezeroing in on a biomarker called Serum HER-2/neu, which is excreted into the blood bybreast tumor cells. “The marker is present atextremely low levels in normal female blood,”explains Diagnostics unit Vice President forGlobal Molecular R&D Dr. Norbert Piel. “Butwhen breast cancer arises, it reaches higher

Assembling a Vision. And that’s exactly whatSiemens has. As of January 1, Diagnostic Prod-ucts Corporation (DPC), based in Los Angeles,California, and Bayer Diagnostics, based in Tarry-town, New York, merged into a vast new, 5.7-billion-euro vision called Siemens Medical Solu-tions Diagnostics that employs about 8,000people. As this happened, Siemens became,according to Bihl, “The first company anywhereto bring in vitro laboratory diagnostics togetherwith in vivo medical imaging.” (For more, seepage 54). Since then, General Electric, with itspurchase of Abbott Laboratories’ DiagnosticsBusiness, has endorsed this vision as well.

Coming on the heels of the $1 billion, 2005purchase of Knoxville, Tennessee-based CTI Mo-lecular Imaging, Inc. (see p. 58), the formationof the Diagnostics unit marks a turning point forSiemens toward becoming what Prof. Dr. ErichR. Reinhardt, President and CEO of Siemens Med-ical Solutions Group, calls “the world’s first full-service diagnostics company.” Indeed, Siemensnow combines a vast value chain that stretchesfrom molecular diagnostics and immunoassays,to blood, urine and tissue tests, to imagingmodalities ranging from pre-clinical research

Iron nanoparticles are being used in combination

with MR to determine if cancer has spread

to lymph nodes: Red/cancerous, green/normal.

Only normal nodes absorb the particles.

1 2 3


and $481 million in 2005 sales, DPC is knownfor its IMMULITE series of analyzers, wide rangeof immunoassays, and spectrum of allergy pan-els. The company includes an assay R&D centerin Los Angeles and a systems and software R&Dcenter in Flanders, New Jersey.

Bayer Diagnostics, on the other hand, whichhad sales in 2005 of 1.4 billion euros, adds some5,400 employees (more than 600 in R&D) toSiemens, as well as a number of R&D centers,including instrument and reagent developmentin Tarrytown, New York; Molecular R&D inBerkeley, California; basic research in cancerprognostic biomarkers in Leverkusen, Germany;and oncology testing development in Walpole,Massachusetts. The company offers a wide rangeof lab automation systems, including its ADVIAfamilies of clinical chemistry and immunoassaysystems, as well as hematology, urinalysis,blood gas, diabetes, and molecular testingsystems for hospital and dedicated laboratoriesand physicians’ offices.

nection between in vitro (lab) tests and in vivo(imaging) goes well beyond economics. Tomor-row’s lab tests will move increasingly to a mo-lecular level of analysis. If indications of cancer,for instance, are detected in an initial test,more detailed lab tests could identify the can-cer cells’ genetic qualities, thus indicating thebest medication for controlling it. Imaging wouldthen be ordered to precisely track the tumor’sresponse over time. (see p. 57). “I think there’sgreat potential for linking in vitro and in vivoinformation on patients,” says David Okrongly,PhD, who heads the Diagnostics unit’s newMolecular Business. “This will drive workflowon each patient around a combination of labo-ratory and in vivo imaging results that will helpto move patients through the healthcare sys-tem with increasing efficiency.”

As in vitro and in vivo diagnostics comecloser together, a third element — knowledge-based information technology — will becomethe key to new applications in molecular medi-

Lab automation systems maximize throughput and

accuracy as they read bar codes on blood samples

(left) to determine which tests to perform. Informa-

tion technology (below) prioritizes tests and results.

Valued at a total of 5.7 billion euros, theacquisitions have turned Siemens into a majorplayer in the $32 billion in vitro diagnostics(IVD) market (see page 73). “Siemens MedicalSolutions Diagnostics competes in about two-thirds of that market,” says Chief Executive Offi-cer Tony Bihl. “The merger creates synergiesthat will allow us to be much faster than ourcompetitors in meeting customer needs. It alsocoincides with the growing need for conven-tional and genetic testing, which is driven byan aging population and steadily increasingdemand for improved healthcare in developingcountries.”

Healthy Synergies. To understand what thenew diagnostics subsidiary means for Med,consider this: Seventy percent of all medicaldiagnoses are based on the results of lab tests.Lab tests play a crucial role in determiningwhether imaging tests, which are much morecostly, should be ordered or not. But the con-


Molecular Medicine | Trends

prostate cancers, metastases first occur innearby lymph nodes. Because macrophages innormal nodes clear impurities from the bloodefficiently, any circulating magnetic nano parti-cles wind up inside these nodes. Cancerousnodes, on the other hand, absorb few if any ofthe particles. The result, thanks to close collab-oration between Krieg’s team, researchers atMassachusetts General Hospital, and imagingand data integration specialists from SiemensCorporate Research in Princeton, New Jersey, isa new MR imaging technology that simplifiesidentification and classification of lymph nodesby producing a color-coded map showing thosenodes that are healthy (green), questionable(yellow), and cancerous (red) in a 3D anatomicalimage. The technology, according to MGH’s Dr.Mahmood, is now being tested in a clinical trial.“Because of its ease of use,” says Mahmood,“this will help to accelerate the introduction ofnanoparticle imaging into community practiceonce the agent is approved by the FDA.”

Working with a completely different class ofbiomarkers, Siemens scientists involved in posi-tron emission tomography research have addeda fluorine-18 label to a subtly alteredthymidine molecule (a closerelation to thymine, which isone of the four structuralunits of DNA) as a funda-mental vehicle for study-ing the mechanism ofcell growth in cancer.Since the substance —now known as FLT — isnearly a perfect copy of thenaturally-occurring molecule“it is absorbed by cells — par-ticularly cancer cells because of their highergrowth rates — in proportion to normal thymi-dine, but doesn’t actually get incorporated intothe cells’ DNA,” explains Ward Digby, PhD,Director of Biomarker Product Management atSiemens’ Molecular Imaging Division in Knox-ville, Tennessee. “FLT has become a powerfulpre-clinical research tool in determining howcancer cells grow, and could be used in moni-toring therapies in humans,” he adds.

IT: Putting the Picture Together. If there isone challenge that towers above all others increating a full service diagnostics company, it ishow to integrate the vast and growing bodiesof data from the worlds of in vivo and in vitrodiagnostics — two fields that have historicallybeen miles apart. Already, however, a practicalsolution is taking shape at MassachusettsGeneral Hospital, where a major Siemens-MGHproject called the Molecular Imaging Portal isbeing developed (for more, see page 70). De-

signed to provide a platform for the integrationof pre-clinical, clinical, genetic, proteomic andmedical imaging data, the Portal represents thefirst step toward what may eventually becomea universal decision support tool for everyonein the medical sciences. “It’s a fantastic, newresearch tool,” says Digby. Adds MGH’s Mah-mood, “The long-range idea behind the projectis that as genetic information on patients be-comes more affordable, doctors will be able tocombine it with lab tests and imaging data tooptimize and personalize therapy and makebetter predictions as to outcome.”

Working along similar lines, researchers fromSiemens Corporate Technology and SiemensMedical Solutions are researching analyticaltools for a 16.7 million euros, four-year, EU-sponsored program called Health-e-Child (seep. 72). The project will integrate genetic, clinicaland epidemiological information on a numberof pediatric diseases with a view to developingclinical decision support systems (CDSS).

Meanwhile, Siemens is also expanding itsREMIND (Reliable Extraction and MeaningfulInference from Nonstructured Data) medical

decision support system. The systemdevelops personalized knowl-

edge models by mining largeamounts of patient data,

including imaging, clinical,and genetic information,and combining thesewith medical knowledge.

These models can then beused to develop personal-

ized therapy plans at the pointof care. Furthermore, Siemenscontinues to improve its Gene-

Sim genetic knowledge, physician-supportportal (see p. 70).

The outlines of where such systems — aswell as the broader trends in molecular medi-cine — will take us are gradually taking shape.Like a vast funnel, information from countlesssources will gradually be distilled into decisionsupport tools that will be available whereverand whenever they are needed through inte-grated hospital software platforms such asSoarian, and with key information and decisiondocumentation being recorded in an electronicpatient file. Furthermore, just as imagingmodalities such as PET and CT have been inte-grated, the information from such systems willbe combined with a torrent of data generatedfrom armies of yet-to-be-developed moleculartests that will, in turn, be derived from our ex-ploration of the human genome — a drivedown a moonless highway where many, manytowns are yet to be named.

� Arthur F. Pease

Ligend (left) and iron oxide particle

Avision of a radically different healthcarefuture is transforming Siemens Medical

Solutions (Med). That vision, which is based onlinking the data that comes from lab tests — invitro diagnostics — with in vivo data frommedical imaging, took a giant step towardrealization on January 1, 2007. On that date,Diagnostic Products Corporation (DPC), head-quartered in Los Angeles, California, joinedwith Bayer Diagnostics, headquartered in Tarry-town, New York, to form Siemens Medical Solu-tions Diagnostics. The new unit — a subsidiaryof Siemens Medical Solutions USA — employsabout 8,000 people, approximately 1,000 ofwhom are involved in R&D.

Thanks to the addition of this new unit,Siemens Med has become the world’s secondlargest immunodiagnostics company. With atotal of 41,000 people worldwide and sales of8.23 billion euros in 2006, Med is one of themajor players in the worldwide healthcare mar-ket. With over 2,500 employees (440 in R&D)

The acquisitions of Diagnostic Products Corporation and Bayer Diagnostics have broughtexciting new technologiesto Siemens — openingthe door to a revolutionarysymbiosis of the previous-ly separate worlds of laboratory data and clinical imaging.

| In Vitro Diagnostics

TheRightMix


| In Vivo Diagnostics

Nipping Deadly Diseases in the BudResearchers are developing biomarkers that bind to key substances associatedwith Alzheimer’s, cancer and heart disease. As they learn to visualize these bio-markers with refined imaging technologies, they are discovering how to identifyinitial changes in cell metabolism, and opening the door to new therapies.

With the help of PET/CT images and marker

substances, physicians can determine if and

where metastases have formed in the body

of a cancer patient.

Dangerous diseases often develop slowly,and can take several years before their first

symptoms appear. Long before that happens,however, the body’s metabolism begins tochange. With a view to detecting illnesses whenmetabolic changes begin to occur — and thus

improving the probability of successful treat-ment, experts from a variety of clinical and re-search fields have been working together forseveral years to, for instance, identify and detectbiomarkers produced by cancers before tumorsdevelop and spread, and to identify the earliest

indications of plaques deposits in blood vesselsbefore coronary vessels are compromised. Thekey to early disease detection is molecularmedicine, a field that is rapidly gaining in im-portance due to the evolving convergence ofthree previously separate fields. These fields


Molecular Medicine | In Vitro Diagnostics

cine (see p. 70). For instance, diagnostic medi-cine is already benefiting from a growing popu-lation of computer-aided diagnostic in vivo im-age screening systems — systems that can siftthrough thousands of lung or intestinal CT orMR slices in minutes and draw a radiologist’sattention to the one image that may in-dicate the presence of a cancerousnode or polyp. “What all these sys-tems have in common is the needfor pattern-matching algorithmsand data integration,” says LanceLadic, PhD, strategic developmentmanager at SCR. “That will be all themore so as we integrate biomarker pat-tern signatures and genetic information intothe larger clinical picture.”

Molecular Future. Considering the breadth ofactivities at Siemens Medical Solutions Diag-nostics, it’s interesting that its molecular busi-ness segment, which accounts for just a fewpercentage points in sales, happens to bewhere about 20 percent of its R&D employeeshave landed. But although gene analysis andmolecular diagnostics represent a mere $1.5billion market within the vast IVD spectrum,they clearly represent one of the most excitinggrowth opportunities in the entire field. “Wantto know where the future is?” asks Okrongly,“Genomics. Advances in gene analysis will giveus the ability to identify each person’s predis-positions to disease; and advances in moleculardiagnostics will give us the tools with which toidentify the presence of disease and decidewhich medications a patient will respond to.”

The Diagnostics unit’s Molecular Businesssegment is divided into two major areas. Thefirst, infectious disease testing, enjoys a five tosix percent annual growth rate and is currentlythe biggest part of the molecular market. Here,the Diagnostics unit focuses on monitoring ma-jor infectious diseases, such as human immuno-deficiency virus (HIV, see image right) and thehepatitis B and C viruses (HBV and HCV). In thisarea, exciting monitoring systems, such as theVersant 440, have recently been released in

Europe and are in the approval process in theU.S. About the size of a professional desktopcopier and designed to process dozens of sam-ples simultaneously, the Versant 440 uses atechnique called branched DNA (bDNA) — socalled because chemical branches attach to the

sample, thus allowing probes (think ofornaments on a Christmas tree) to

fasten themselves in enormousnumbers to the original nucleicacid target. The result: amplifica-tion of the signal from the viral

RNA or DNA with an unparalleledlevel of accuracy and automation. Of particular interest for large labora-

tories is the unit’s new Phoenix technology. ThePhoenix system is designed to process two sep-arate targets of up to 96 samples simultane-ously in about three hours. Currently in develop-ment and expected to enter the market in 2008,Phoenix will not only offer industry-leading auto-mation, sensitivity and speed, but is also design-ed to allow customers to run assays they them-selves develop. As with bDNA, Phoenix isolatesviral RNA and DNA from a serum sample usingchemicals that open the target cells. “But in-stead of amplifying the target’s signal, Phoenixuses an established process called quantitativereal-time polymerase chain reaction to amplifyeither the RNA or DNA target,” says Dr. NorbertPiel, Vice President for Global Molecular R&D atSiemens Medical Solutions Diagnostics. For RNAtargets, it does so by ‘transcribing’ a section ofviral RNA into so-called complementaryDNA (cDNA). “Here, the DNA is ex-posed to an enzyme that makesmillions of copies, and a probethat includes a fluorescentdye is added,” explains Piel.“Then, if you excite the dyewith light, you get a fluo-rescent signal that can tellyou the concentration ofthe virus in the blood.”

The new level of flexibilitycreated by Phoenix is particularlyimportant for the Diagnostics unit it-

self because, according to Piel, “the same tech-nology that will be used for the detection of in-fectious diseases can also be applied in oncologyand cardiology, as well as to emergency condi-tions, such as septic shock, and hematologicalconditions such as leukemia. In short, Phoenixwill open up entirely new lines of business.”

Emerging Markets. And that takes us to thesecond, but most exciting segment of the Diag-nostics unit’s molecular business, which is theemerging oncology and cardiovascular testingmarket. “This is a market that represents onlyabout $400 million worldwide today. But it’sgrowing at 20 to 25 percent per year,” says Bihl.“As more and more new disease markers areidentified, demand for reliable tests to detectthem is growing. And as those tests come tomarket, they create tremendous growth.” In-deed, the Diagnostics unit has already discov-ered a handful of biomarkers unique to breastcancer, and has patented associated tests thatare planned to run on the Phoenix platform.“What we propose to do,” says Okrongly, “is totake a small tissue sample, process it on a mo-lecular instrument like Phoenix, and provide anassessment of low, medium, or high risk for aparticular tumor.”

“The vision is clear,” sums up Bihl. “As wemove toward improved understanding of thehuman genome, we will be able to identifypeople with a predisposition to certain dis-eases. Regular monitoring of those potential

conditions will follow. Then, if a conditiondoes arise, it can be quickly identi-

fied through specialized in vitroand in vivo tests and associ-

ated, targeted therapeutics.The entire process will beintegrated and brought to-gether in a workflow-op-timized electronic patientrecord. What we’re talking

about — if we can do itcost-effectively — would be

revolutionary.”� Arthur F. Pease

Automated labs use high volume analytical systems

such as Siemens’ ADVIA LabCell to test samples.

Analysis can identify viruses such as HIV (below)

and seamlessly connect with IT systems (right).


Researchers believe that such markers will makeit possible in the future to identify Alzheimer’sseveral years before the onset of symptoms.

Understanding Metabolism. Ralph Weiss-leder has been working with Siemens since2003. He is involved in the development ofmarkers and preclinical contrast media for test-ing with animals, and also works on integratingdifferent imaging technologies, such as mag-netic resonance tomography (MR) and ironnanoparticles. Weissleder believes that molecu-lar imaging is one of the most promising re-search areas in medicine today, offering the po-tential not only of early identification of manydiseases, but also of improved diagnostic andtherapeutic accuracy. “Molecular imaging canhelp to significantly reduce unnecessary treat-ments and surgery,” Weissleder explains. What’smore, he points out that in the future, fluores-cent probes will be available that will be able tozero in on cancer cells, allowing surgeons to de-tect and eliminate cancer cells that might other-wise have been left behind, thus significantlyimproving the probability of long-term recovery.

With an eye on the vast field of biomarkers,Siemens is expanding its molecular imagingR&D center in Los Angeles. The center has al-ready received FDA approval to start clinical trialson a new imaging biomarker for Alzheimer’s dis-ease. One of the challenges in developing newbiomarkers is how to gain an understanding ofunderlying metabolic processes in order toidentify substances that will bind to key ele-ments of such processes. Such substances canthen be synthesized with the help of specificchemical reactions (click chemistry), after whichthey can be marked with a radioactive isotope.FL-thymidine (FLT) is a very promising new bio-marker candidate that is now being studied bySiemens researchers. FLT penetrates into the

Helping Customers with MI LifeNet

The Molecular Imaging division at Siemens

Medical Solutions has set up an extensive Web-

based information and learning portal known as

“MI LifeNet” (www.mi-lifenet.com).

“MI LifeNet is particularly helpful for customers

who are using a PET/CT or SPECT/CT device for

the first time and wish to begin working in the

area of molecular imaging,” says Barry Scott, MI

LifeNet project manager in Knoxville, Tennessee.

Users also receive on-site assistance, of course,

but MI LifeNet enables doctors and technicians

to become acquainted with the systems even

before they’re installed. The portal continues to

provide assistance if questions come up later on.

It also supports oncologists and others who

don’t use the devices themselves, but send

patients on to specialists who do. MI LifeNet

provides them with information on the possibilities offered by MI, as well as its clinical significance,

thereby making it easier for them to work with MI specialists. One of the portal’s most important

features is MI University, which went online in mid-2006 and has already been used by around 300

customers. Every month, MI University presents new case studies that highlight the potential offered

by PET/CT, SPECT/CT and MI.

The detailed case studies, of which there are currently more than 130, contain a description of the

illness in question, possible differential diagnoses, and information on treatments and follow-up

examinations. They are placed on the portal by experienced users of advanced imaging devices, who

provide their own comments as well.

MI University also posts more than 30 lectures that present and explain imaging devices, the physics

they’re based on, possible sources of errors, special indications, and aspects of molecular imaging

that are subject to controversy. Several lectures take the form of videos as well. “We want our custom-

ers to use MI LifeNet as an everyday tool, a reference system and a resource for learning, marketing

and communicating,” says Scott.

Users in the U.S., for example, can utilize MI LifeNet to directly access PETNET, where they can order

PET biomarkers for delivery on a specified date for use in an examination. Scott stresses the fact that

MI LifeNet is unique at the moment: “In terms of the PET market, this Internet platform represents a

service that clearly sets us apart from our competitors,” he says.

Pre-clinical research. CT (left, center) and PET/CT

are used for imaging mice. The results can reveal

the precise progress of tumor growth and the

destruction of bones (right).


Molecular Medicine | In Vivo Diagnostics

the late 1990s, Siemens Medical Solutions (Med)developed a device consisting of a PET unit anda computer tomograph (CT). Known as the bio-graph, the new device was presented at theRSNA 2000. The device directly links PET and CT,which it uses to examine the same bodysegment (see Pictures of the Future, Fall 2005,p. 73). The result is an anatomically high-resolu-tion CT image produced in one imaging sweep,which precisely displays a tumor and its meta-bolic activity (through PET) in its exact position.Such an image makes it easier for surgeons to,

are in vitro diagnostics (lab-based analysis ofliquids and tissues, see page 54), knowledge-based information technology (see p. 70) and,above all, in vivo diagnostics imaging.

Two Technologies, One Image. One of themost established molecular imaging technolo-gies is positron emission tomography (PET).Here, a marker such as radioactively taggedsugar 2-deoxy-2[F-18]fluoro-D-glucose (FDG)is injected. Because cancer cells have a highermetabolism than other cells, and thus consumemore glucose, the marker tends to accumulatein such cells, which thus light up in a PET imageas the marker decays, thus releasing its gammarays. PET detectors absorb these rays and con-vert them into weak flashes of light that a com-

to two to four millimeters,” says Newiger. Thatlevel of resolution has more or less alreadybeen achieved. Because of these limitations,small structures may appear as larger spots inPET images. But thanks to CT, with its resolutionof up to 150 micrometers, fine substructuresand their relationship to surrounding tissuescan be exactly visualized.

A Picture of Alzheimer’s. Furthermore, med-ical specialists want to be able to make moreprecise statements regarding certain metabolic

Researchers have developed nanoparticles thathome in on vulnerable plaques in blood vessels.

puter converts into images. Starting in the mid1980s, researchers began using PET to tracksugar metabolism in the brain. Since the mid-1990s PET has been used clinically to locateprimary tumors and metastases and to indicate— depending on tumor size — whether cancertherapies are effective.

But used alone, PET is insufficient because itmerely shows the presence of abnormal meta-bolism without revealing the exact position ofthe tumor within the body. Anatomical infor-mation, the location of internal organs, andeven the body’s outlines are often missing fromPET images. Considering these limitations, in

for example, plan operations. The combinedtechnology has been dramatically successful.“We now almost exclusively sell PET units withCT functionality,” says Dr. Hartwig Newiger, whois responsible for Molecular Imaging Collabora-tions and Product Support in Europe at Med.

In spite of the biograph’s success, research-ers want to achieve more. For instance, theywould like to improve the biograph’s operatingspeed. They are also working on more efficientalgorithms in order to improve contrast resolu-tion and recognition of specific details. Such al-gorithms are important “because the resolutionof whole-body PET systems is physically limited

PET/CT images reveal the development of metastasizing lymph nodes in an anatomical context.

processes that cannot be identified with FDG.Med is therefore working with renowned re-search institutes around the world to developnew marker substances that will be able to pin-point and make visible even very small meta-stases and individual tumors, while at the sametime identifying the type of tumor in question.

In 2005, following years of collaborative de-velopment work, Siemens acquired CTI Molec-ular Imaging, Inc., one of the world’s leadingmanufacturers of PET devices and PET markersubstances. Experts from the resulting hybridorganization — Siemens Medical SolutionsMolecular Imaging (MI) — are now developingtechnologies that make the most of recenthardware developments to better visualizenew, radioactively-tagged biomarkers.

Siemens is also working closely with inde-pendent molecular imaging specialists such asProf. Michael Phelps from the Department ofMolecular and Medical Pharmacology at the Uni-versity of California in Los Angeles, and Prof.Ralph Weissleder, Director of the Center forMolecular Imaging Research at MassachusettsGeneral Hospital in Boston (p. 74). In the De-cember 2006 issue of the renowned New Eng-land Journal of Medicine, scientists workingwith Phelps reported on a new Alzheimer’smarker developed in cooperation with Siemens.

Siemens holds an exclusive license for thenew marker, which binds specifically with pro-teins called amyloid plaques that build up in thebrains of Alzheimer’s patients. When taggedwith a short-lived radioactive substance, themarkers can be clearly visualized in PET scans,thus indicating damaged areas (p. 60). Thanksto this evolving technology, patients suspectedof having Alzheimer’s can be clearly distin-guished from patients with other types of de-mentia and from healthy subjects, thus open-ing the door to future targeted treatments.


Detecting Cancer with Ultrasound

Along with PET and SPECT, ultrasound is also

becoming established as a molecular imaging

modality. Here too, research is focused on the

development of new contrast media that can

help to detect diseased structures at an early

stage. Cadence CPS technology in particular is

mostly used here, as it significantly improves the

quality of the images recorded when contrast

media are used. A patented Siemens technology,

Cadence CPS can be found in the ACUSON

Sequoia ultrasound device (top), among others.

Microbubbles filled with air or gas are generally

used as the contrast medium for ultrasound

images, as they stand out very clearly. Special mi-

crobubbles outfitted with designer molecules on

their surfaces will be used in the future for mo-

lecular imaging. These molecules will dock to the

structures in the body — such as the fine blood

vessels of a tumor — that need to be examined,

for example, making them visible as red areas in

an ultrasound image (bottom). At the moment,

Siemens is working with Oregon Health and

Science University on the development of micro-

bubbles that attach to target cells on the walls of

the coronary vessels and finer coronary blood

vessels. In the event of a heart attack or circula-

tory problems, certain types of protein structures,

such as the antigen P-selectin, form on these cells. Over the last two years, the Oregon researchers

have succeeded in creating microbubbles with P-selectin antibodies. When these microbubbles dock to

cells in the walls of coronary vessels, and in the even finer blood vessels in the heart, they make the

damaged areas visible. This method makes it possible for the first time to determine at an early stage

whether a patient complaining of chest pains actually has heart trouble. The affected vessel segment

appears in the ultrasound image as a luminous structure. The new contrast medium is now being

tested on mice and monkeys at Oregon Health and Science University. The same principle can be ap-

plied to detecting tumors, as fast-growing tumors greatly stimulate the growth of new blood vessels

(angiogenesis), upon whose surface the antigen ανβ3 can be found. In animal testing, tumors have

already been detected with the help of microbubbles containing ανβ3 antibodies. “The advantage of

ultrasound is that patients generally do not respond negatively to the contrast media used with it, and

the media also don’t emit any radiation, which is not the case with PET and SPECT,” says Jens Fehre,

head of Urology Product Life Cycle Management at Siemens Medical Solutions in Erlangen. “In addi-

tion, ultrasound examinations can be performed right at the hospital bed.” Ultrasound also offers

another benefit: The microbubbles can be used to transport medication. This can be accomplished by

using a powerful ultrasound pulse to burst them once they’ve docked to the target tissue, releasing

angiogenesis inhibitors directly in the tumor, for example. This medication transport procedure is

being tested with animals. Another procedure in which microbubbles dissolve dangerous thromboses

will enter the clinical testing phase in just a few weeks. Here, bubbles collect at a clot and are then

made to oscillate by means of short ultrasound pulses; the oscillation destroys the clot. An initial ap-

plication of this technique will be the destruction of clots that form in the catheters used with dialysis

patients. In the future, the method will also be used to help treat the effects of strokes. A group of

researchers headed by Prof. Ferdinand Frauscher at the Medical University Innsbruck, Austria recently

proved that conventional contrast media can also be used to detect cancer. Researchers employed a

conventional contrast medium and the ACUSON Sequoia to visualize a prostate carcinoma that could

barely be seen in a normal ultrasound image taken without a contrast medium. Frauscher showed

that this technique can greatly increase the accuracy of biopsies, as normal prostate biopsies often

fail to detect a tumor, which in many cases means that the procedure must be repeated.

tion in question. The advantage offered bySiemens PET scanners is that they use aunique, ultra-sensitive detector material devel-oped and manufactured by MI in Knoxville thatefficiently transforms extremely weak radiationinto visible light, which in turn results in im-ages that enable scientists to precisely observethe effects that substances under study haveon test animals.

Increasingly sensitive detectors even makeit possible to view the interaction betweenimmune cells and their target organs (lymphnodes, thymus), or the activities of animalbrain receptors, in real time. Inveon SPECT de-livers even better spatial resolution, albeit withlower sensitivity than PET. This drawback is par-tially offset, however, by the fact that SPECT ex-aminations do not require cyclotrons. The CTportion of a scan, for its part, provides preciseanatomical information for measuring bonedensity during osteoporosis examinations, forexample. Depending on the type of study inquestion, medical researchers can use anycombination of SPECT, CT and PET from a workstation. They can even conduct scans utilizingall three procedures, which in turn enables sev-eral parameters to be studied simultaneously.

Pinpointing Effective Medications. In vivodiagnostics and devices such as Inveon are suit-able for diverse preclinical research applica-tions, “because many basic biochemicalprocesses in humans and mice are very similar,”explains Dr. Antje Schulte, who is responsiblefor Product Support at Med in Erlangen. Amongthe phenomena studied are brain structuresthat give rise to Alzheimer’s disease, receptorsfor addictive drugs and the effectiveness ofnew cancer medications. “In the past, PET,SPECT and CT were mostly used by research in-stitutes as basic research tools; today, more andmore pharmaceutical companies are employ-ing the devices for product-related researchpurposes,” explains Schulte. Pharmaceuticalcompanies also want to find out if a substanceis suitable for use as a medication, or if it wouldbe better to abandon it immediately. That’s be-cause the sooner a substance can be excluded,the more money can be made available for thestudy of more promising candidates.

Revolutionary Combination. Siemens worksclosely with external experts in order to ensurethat its medical equipment and related soft-ware meets the practical requirements of itscustomers. One such expert is Dr. Bernd Pichlerfrom the University of Tübingen, Germany,who was responsible for setting up Siemens’European Training and Reference Lab at Tübin-gen. The lab specializes in training new users in



interior of a cell and works at the molecular level.The FLT molecule is similar to thymidine, oneof the building blocks of DNA. It accumulatesparticularly in those areas where DNA is produ-ced in large quantities, in other words, in tumors.FLT is also better than FDG at identifying cellgrowth and distinguishing it from infections.

Fluorine-18 (18-F) is a key isotope used inconjunction with PET scanning. But like otherPET isotopes, it requires the use of particle ac-celerator (cyclotron) to produce it — devicesthat are beyond the capabilities of many hospi-tals. With this in mind, Siemens has spent yearsbuilding up an order and supply network forPET isotopes. Known as PETNET, the network iswell established in the United States, the UKand South Korea. Naturally, Siemens also sellscyclotrons to hospitals and laboratories. Theseunits from Siemens’ Eclipse product family areconnected to Explora biomarker productionmachines, which automatically attach the iso-tope generated in the cyclotron to a carrier sub-stance. Radioactive markers are also used with

another imaging method known as single pho-ton emission computed tomography, or SPECT.The advantage of such markers is that they donot require a cyclotron for their production, asthe radioactive isotope most frequently usedwith SPECT — technetium-99m (99mTc) — canbe produced with a relatively small “generator.”

Research on Animal Models. New markersand molecular imaging technologies requirepreclinical research. That’s why Med also fo-cuses on the development of imaging tech-niques that are tailored for use with rodentsand primates. These methods make it possibleto monitor the course a disease takes in an an-imal over a long period, enabling new and evenmore specific marker substances to be testedand later used in human patients. Use of theseimaging techniques does not mean that ani-

mals must be killed in order to gain detailedinformation regarding their physiologicalprocesses. On the contrary, MI makes it possi-ble to study test animals, which may representyears of research, over extended periods oftime in order to determine the effect of med-ications and the course of therapy.

Until recently, Siemens supplied separate“microPET” and “microCAT” devices for PET andCT examinations of animals. However, as hasalready occurred with respect to human med-ical applications, these devices have beenmerged into a single, combined machineknown as “Inveon.” Depending on a researchproject’s requirements, animal PET and CT capa-bilities can now be linked, and even supple-mented by a SPECT unit.

Such flexibility makes it possible to choosethe best imaging technique for the examina-

Diagnosing Alzheimer’s with PET. A new marker

structure (inset) binds to plaques (yellow and red on

right) typical of Alzheimer’s. At left: a healthy brain;

center image: initial cognitive disturbances.

A prototype MR/PET unit combines MR (left) and PET (right) images of the human brain in a single image (center) that describes both anatomy and physiology.

Siemens has received FDA approval to start clinical trials on a new biomarker for Alzheimer’s.

| Molecular Therapy

Zeroing in onCancer

Researchers have devel-oped iron nanoparticlesthat zero in on tumors.The particles can be usedas drug delivery vehiclesor can be exposed to focused magnetic fields,thus delivering lethal heatto hard-to-reach lesions.


Iron-bearing nanoparticles could be injected

directly into a brain tumor and then heated using

a focused magnetic field. The heat can weaken

and even kill cancer cells.

“The goal is to find the best possible balancebetween therapeutic benefit and toxic effect,”says Alexiou. “Physicians and medical research-ers have therefore focused on the developmentof drug targeting methods that are designed toincrease the concentration of the active ingre-dient in a cytotoxic medication on the targetwhile limiting its effects on surrounding,healthy tissues.”

With this in mind, Alexiou has been work-ing on a new, localized chemotherapeuticmethodology since 1996 (for details, see box,p. 64). Known as magnetic drug targeting(MDT), the method is based on the applicationof a magnetic field to guide iron particlesloaded with a therapeutic agent to a tumorand hold them there.

“In order to expose the particles to thehighest possible traction force, MDT uses mag-nets with inhomogeneous fields,” explains Dr.Wolfgang Schmidt, an expert in magnetdesign at Siemens Corporate Technology inErlangen. “The goal of MDT is to concentratethe active ingredient specifically in the tumor

region while at the same time minimizing theside effects of chemotherapy.”

From Heavyweight to Featherweight.From December 2003 through December2006, Alexiou, Siemens Corporate Technology,Siemens Medical Solutions, and others haveparticipated in a nanomagnetic medicine proj-ect sponsored by the German Federal Ministryof Education and Research (BMBF). The projectis designed to advance MDT technologies.

“Until now, MDT studies have been con-ducted worldwide with permanent magnets orlarge electromagnets, the latter being as largeas 1.5 tons,” says Schmidt. “Because of theirweight, however, such magnets are in a fixedposition, which means that the patient mustbe repositioned frequently during treatment.”

Considering these limitations, Siemens re-searchers have tried a different approach.They designed and built a unique pivotableelectromagnet that has a readily accessiblepole tip and weighs in at a mere 47 kilograms,yet maintains a high field gradient.

The new, ultra-light-weight magnet bene-fits from the use of advanced materials andsimulation-based design optimization. It is alsothe product of years of experience in magnetengineering. In fact, its developers drew onexperience developing magnetic systems forvarious Siemens Groups, such as a supportingmagnet for the maglev train and a magnet forimproving traction between a locomotive andthe track. Now they have achieved what Alex-iou calls “a true quantum leap, like that fromthe first portable telephone to the cell phone,”in the medical engineering field.

“Thanks to its light weight and optimizedpole tip, a physician can handle the newmagnet easily and can position it exactly overa tumor. This makes it possible to reliably treateven small lesions,” says Alexiou. Adds Wolf-gang Schmidt: “Our new magnet could easilybe integrated into a hybrid clinical device con-sisting of a C-arm, the magnet and a magneticresonance tomograph.”

Findings developed on animal models(squamous epithelial carcinoma in a rabbit) in-



cautions Dr. Arne Hengerer, mMRI project man-ager at Med, “It will definitely take at least eightyears for the first mMRI markers to reach themarket.”

Iron Nanoparticles. There are already severalpromising approaches. For example, an mMRImarker consisting of an iron nanoparticle that’sabsorbed by macrophages is now being clini-cally tested. Macrophages are immune cellsfound primarily in lymph nodes. But if a nodeharbors cancer cells, the number of immunecells in it declines. Thus, if injected nanoparti-cles fail to be absorbed by a lymph node, it is anindication of metastatic cancer, since cancersspread primarily via the lymph nodes.

Another mMRI contrast medium is being de-veloped by Nano AG, a consortium led bySiemens’ Hengerer. Nano AG is working closelywith Charité Hospital, Ferropharm, Scheringand Mevis, the University of Freiburg, and theGerman Cancer Research Center in Heidelberg.The consortium’s project is also being fundedby the German Ministry of Education and Re-search. Under development is a new mediumthat contains iron oxide nanoparticles de-signed to specifically home in on so-called“vulnerable plaques” in blood vessels. Theseplaques deposits are unstable and thus capableof triggering clotting that can suddenly block avessel, resulting in heart attack or stroke.

If doctors could recognize vulnerable pla-ques at an early stage and distinguish such de-posits from relatively harmless stable plaques,patients could be treated with special medica-tions and might be able to avoid life-threateningclotting incidents. And that’s precisely the goalset by Nano AG. In view of such possibilities,Robert Krieg believes that the future belongs tomMRI. Iron oxide contrast media now being stud-ied already indicate just how valuable the com-bination of advanced imaging and targeted con-trast media promises to be in terms of under-standing disease pathology, accurately diag-nosing conditions, and ultimately developingtreatments that stop diseases before they posea life-threatening risk. Thanks to all of this, itmay indeed one day be possible to nip deadlydiseases in the bud. � Tim Schröder

small animal imaging as well as in assessingnew devices to determine their suitability foreveryday use — microCAT, microPET and Inveonare among the machines it has tested.

Molecular imaging is one focus of Pichler’swork, and with it he has examined phenomenasuch as oxygen-starved tumors, which are knownas hypoxic tumors. “Remarkably, tissue areas sub-ject to poor circulation like these are especiallyresistant to radiation treatment and chemo-therapy,” says Pichler. The goal here is to locatehypoxic areas using specific markers so as to beable to combat tumors with a more targetedapproach. Such an approach would also ensurethat healthy tissues, and the patient’s body as awhole, would be exposed to the least possibleamount of medical treatment. With this in mind,Siemens, together with Pichler, is currentlydeveloping entirely new, combined devices forsmall animal imaging that will put MR and PETscanning into a single device.

In addition to visualizing soft tissues, MRcan be used for imaging the circulatory systemwhen employed in conjunction with a contrastmedium. This can, among other things, facili-tate identification of otherwise hard-to-detecthypoxic tumors. Considering these benefits,Siemens and the University of Tübingen plan tobegin testing a prototype MR/PET scanner thisSpring that will be used exclusively for studiesof the human brain.

MR is also becoming more and more impor-tant in molecular imaging. “The great thing aboutMR is that it can be used to pinpoint diseasemarkers,” says Dr. Robert Krieg, head of Molec-ular MRI at Med in Erlangen. For instance, a pa-tient can be injected with a contrast mediumthat is designed to accumulate only in tumortissue, while producing a clear signal that iscaptured in an MR image. New types of con-trast media are much more specific, however,because they deliver images of the patient’sentire anatomy as well as the target tissue’sphysiological activity after just one sweep ofthe body by the imaging device. Known asmMRI (molecular Magnetic Resonance Imaging),the development of specific molecular markersis expected to open up a range of new diagnos-tic and therapeutic possibilities. “However,”

Is it cancer? An arrow indicates a suspicious point in the pancreas, left PET, center CT, right combined image.

Cancer is the second leading cause of deathafter heart disease. Each year, on a world-

wide basis, almost seven million people die ofthe consequences of cancer, according to theGlobocan 2002 database of the InternationalAgency for Research on Cancer (www-dep.iarc.fr). “In Germany alone, 425,000 people peryear are newly diagnosed with cancer,” saysDr. Christoph Alexiou, chief physician anddirector of the Laboratory for Nanotechnologyand Local Tumor Therapy at the Ear, Nose andThroat Clinic of the Erlangen University Hospi-tal in Germany.

Conventional cancer treatment today usu-ally calls for the surgical removal of malignanttumors and then, if necessary, administrationof radiotherapy or chemotherapy. These meth-ods cure approximately half of all cancers.

But the other half involve tumors that are lo-cated in sensitive areas, such as near an impor-tant nerve or blood vessel. Here, chemotherapyand radiotherapy remain the treatments ofchoice. However, these treatment have frequent-ly been associated with serious side effects.


Commission (CEA), Guerbet, Alstom and BrukerBioSpin MRI, and with the University of Freiburg.It is also part of a German-French research proj-ect known as INUMAC (Imaging of neuro dis-ease using high-field MR and contrastophores)that began in mid-2006. The project focuses ondeveloping the world’s first 11.7 tesla UHF-MRTfor studies on humans. At 11.7 tesla, the mag-

Ultra-high field magnetic resonance tomographsand new types of MR-PET scanners will detectpathological processes at the cellular level.

A 7 tesla magnet being delivered to the Atomic

Energy Commission’s NeuroSpin Center near Paris,

France (top), and an architect’s model of what

the completed center will look like.

Focusing onSingle Cells

| Research Cooperation

Thanks to constant improvements in imag-ing methods such as ultra-high field

magnetic resonance tomography (UHF-MRT),physicians are getting closer to decipheringdefective biological processes at the molecularlevel and tailoring treatments to disease evenbefore the onset of symptoms. Siemens isworking in this field with the Atomic Energy

Magnetic Fields Tackle Tumors

Magnetic drug targeting is a new therapeutic method in the field of local chemotherapy. The trans-

port vehicle for the drugs in this therapy consists of magnetic particles approximately 100 nanometers

in size — about 500 times smaller than the diameter of a hair. They consist of an iron core (10 to 15 na-

nometers) surrounded by a polysaccharide (starch) shell. The medication — in this case mitoxantrone,

a chemotherapeutic drug that is well established in clinical practice — is reversibly bound to the nano-

particles by a chemical bond that is easy to break. Mitoxantrone works by inducing strand breakage in

DNA (deoxyribonucleic acid), thus causing tumor cells to die. As long as the mitoxantrone is in bound

form, it is inactive and does not destroy any healthy cells en route to its destination. But once the nano-

magnetic delivery particles have colonized their target the bond between mitoxantrone and the mag-

netic particles begins to dissolve, thus initiating a slow process of drug release.

First the physician injects an aqueous solution containing the nanoparticle-medication combination

through a catheter into an artery of the patient. Next, the external magnetic field is applied so that the

particles are carried through the blood stream to the target destination and held there. The field is

strongest at the pole tip of the magnet, i.e., close to the skin surface, but it is still strong enough at a

depth of around two centimeters to counteract the internal forces of the blood stream or cell walls. Af-

ter one hour, during which the patient must remain in the magnetic field, the chemotherapeutic drug

is almost completely released from its magnetic delivery vehicle. The team working with Dr. Christoph

Alexiou has demonstrated in an animal model that nanoparticles and medication remain in the tumor

region for more than six hours after the magnetic field is shut down. After that, they accumulate mainly

in the spleen and liver, where they are broken down and then eliminated from the body via the kidneys.


Molecular Medicine | Molecular Therapy

dicate that chemotherapy without side effectsis achievable with MDT. “We have not foundany side effects in either the experimental ani-mals themselves or in their blood workups,”reports Alexiou.

Complete Remission with a Single Dose.But there’s more. In contrast to traditionalchemotherapies, which involve multiple appli-cations, researchers have achieved a completeremission of tumors after only a single dose ofthe nanoparticle-medication combination. “Inaddition, we’ve found evidence of much better

efficacy with only one-fifth the medicationthat would otherwise conventionally be used,”says Alexiou.

At the moment, research is concentratingon tumors near the surface, such as head, neckand skin carcinomas, as well as some breastcancers. In the future, however, deeper tumorswill also be treated with this new method. “Inorder to accomplish that, we will have to builda magnet that delivers its maximum field a fewcentimeters away from the tip,” says Schmidt,who has already developed concepts alongthese lines.

Alexiou also has ambitious plans. “Depend-ing on funding, we hope to conduct prelimi-nary clinical trials on humans in two to threeyears. In the future, we will also be able to cou-ple various other therapeutic agents with mag-netic nanoparticles, such as radioactive sub-stances for radiotherapy or genes for genetherapy. In each case, the therapeutic agentswill be introduced into the tumor in a targetedmanner. In addition, we would like to combineMDT with hyperthermia because each addi-tional effect improves patient outcome,” saysAlexiou.

Human Trials. In local hyperthermia, mag-netic nanoparticles are heated by an externalmagnetic field, which weakens the tumor andenhances the cytotoxic effect of thechemotherapeutic drugs. In contrast to MDT, inwhich an inhomogeneous magnetic field isused, a homogeneous alternating field isneeded for hyperthermia. This is the only wayto induce motion in the nanoparticles contain-ing iron, which ultimately generate heat.

Berlin-based MagForce Nanotechnologies iscurrently conducting research in this field.“With our method, we can reach any tumor inthe body and heat it,” explains CEO and re-searcher Dr. Andreas Jordan. “Our treatmentmethodology involves two components: a ther-apeutic system at the core of which is a mag-netic field applicator developed specially for thepurpose, and nanoparticles.”

The two components have been tested onhumans in several clinical trials since March2003 in Europe. In July 2006, MagForce Nan-otechnologies and Siemens signed a declara-tion of intent with the goal of jointly develop-ing MagForce therapeutic systems andcooperating in the production and distributionof these systems. “We expect to save a lot oftime by taking advantage of Siemens’ extensiveexperience and contacts. This will allow us toconcentrate even more intensely on the devel-opment of our nanoparticles,” says Jordan.

Nanoparticleswith medicalagent

156 nm

Patient

Magnet

Magneticfield gradient

Artery

Image at lower left shows tumor tissue imbued with magnetic nanoparticles.

Pole tip

Tumor

Weighing only 47 kilograms, a unique new elec-

tromagnetic system is being used to focus iron

particles containing medical agents on cancers

in animal studies at the University of Erlangen.

Chemotherapeutic agent (in this case)mitoxantrone

Reversible binding of mitoxantrone to phosphoric acid ester

+

To prepare a treatment, a radiologist takesthree-dimensional images of the position andproperties of a tumor using conventional imag-ing methods. Next, the patient receives an in-jection — directly into the tumor — of a liquidcontaining tiny particles of iron oxide. The par-ticles are then heated by an externally appliedmagnetic field for about 70 minutes.

Cooking Cancers. “Depending on the typeand position of a tumor, nanotechnologicalcancer therapy can be used as a supplementaryor stand-alone therapeutic method,” says Mag-Force Nanotechnologies CEO Jordan. He ex-plains that when cancer cells are heated to46 degrees Celsius (hyperthermia), their repairmechanisms are inactivated, thus enhancingthe cytotoxic effect of an accompanying radio-therapy or chemotherapy. “Furthermore,” addsJordan, “If the tumor is not situated directlynext to major blood vessels or nerves, we heatits cancer cells to more than 70 degrees (ther-moablation), which causes irreparable damageto the cell structure. In essence, its cells arecooked.”

The special advantage here is that thenanoparticles are surrounded by a shell ofsilane — a hydrogen-silicon compound — andcertain biomolecules. “Rapidly dividing cancercells like to eat this shell, so to speak, and ac-tively incorporate it into their own structure,whereas healthy cells do not do this. This strat-egy allows us, for the first time, to very selec-tively attack cancer cells,” says Jordan.

Since no side effects have occurred in clinicaltrials, the procedure can be repeated severaltimes. In the case of a glioblastoma, for exam-ple, which is an extremely malignant braintumor, treatment has prolonged survival timeby half a year. This type of tumor cannot gen-erally be cured, and even when the tumor iscompletely removed, new lesions developrapidly because individual tumor cells havealready migrated through healthy brain tissueprior to surgery.

Jordan is convinced that, “In less than tenyears, our nanoparticle therapy will be as sig-nificant as radiotherapy is today — but withoutthe radiation exposure.” What’s more, he ex-pects that in the future “we will be able to loadnanoparticles with drugs that are activated onsite by heat. This would greatly increase thetolerability and efficacy of chemotherapy,” hesays.

Although MagForce Nanotechnologies andthe ENT Clinic in Erlangen have taken two dif-ferent approaches, they are nevertheless reach-ing for the same goal: effective, life-savingtherapies for many people who have cancer.

� Ulrike Zechbauer


Software now under development promises to help specialists identify malignanttumors more accurately than ever before. A new graphic interface is the key.

Visualizing Tumor Growth

| Research Cooperation

The earlier a tumor is detected, the greaterthe chances of a patient’s survival. Better

imaging diagnostics can help here. One promis-ing approach uses “dynamic contrast medium-enhanced magnetic resonance imaging” (DCE-MRI), a method that allows radiologists todetect the fine network of blood vessels whosegrowth is triggered by a growing tumor in aprocess known as angiogenesis. These bloodvessels, which are just a few thousandths of amillimeter thick, supply the tumor with oxygenand nutrients. Unfortunately, they are too smallto be detected by conventional imaging meth-ods. To circumvent this problem, researchers inthe field of DCE-MRI use a contrast medium tomeasure the microcirculation of blood withinthese minute vessel networks.

Molecules known as growth factors are in-volved in causing tumor blood vessels to grow.These factors also enlarge the pores in vesselwalls, allowing greater quantities of a contrastmedium to flow from normal blood vessels intothe surrounding tumor tissue, where it accumu-lates. Before undergoing a magnetic resonancescan, the patient is injected with a conventionalcontrast medium. The MR scanner then recordsa succession of cross-sectional images of thesuspect area for a period of, say, five minutes,providing the physician with MR signals of ahigh temporal resolution.

The intensity of these signals indicates therate of flow, or “dynamic,” of the contrast

medium. However, this method doesn’t deter-mine how much contrast medium flowsthrough the pores. This is where DCE-MRI evalu-ation software comes in. Using modeling tech-niques, it generates a curve that a radiologistcan use to determine whether the tumor ismalignant or benign. With a benign tumor, thecurve rises less steeply and falls at a later pointthan is the case with a malignant growth.

Up to now, there has been no commerciallyavailable software solution to differentiate be-tween the curves produced by benign and ma-lignant tissue. “Because researchers used theirown evaluation methods, the results weren’tdirectly comparable,” says Dr. Martin Büchert ofthe MR Development and Application Center atthe University Hospital in Freiburg, Germany.“That’s why we have developed, in cooperationwith Siemens, a standardized software solution— the DCE-MRI Task Card. This will improve andspeed up the evaluation of clinical studiesbased on data from different sources.”

Siemens plans to market the DCE-MRI TaskCard in conjunction with its MR scanners.Thanks to its integration with Siemens’ syngomedical interface (see Pictures of the Future,Fall 2006, p. 56), the software will be much eas-ier to use than the programs currently available.At present, the DCE-MRI Task Card is still underdevelopment, but a demo package is alreadybeing tested. “Using feedback from tests, we canmake the software more user-friendly,” says Dr.

Ralph Strecker, who heads development of theDCE-MRI Task Card at Siemens Medical Solutions.

One person who is testing the software isDr. Anwar Padhani, an expert in the field ofDCE-MRI at the Mount Vernon Cancer Centre inLondon. Padhani uses the technique in clinicalresearch and in standard radiological examina-tions. The radiologist rates the dynamic MRprocess highly, because it enables detection ofmany different types of cancer, including breastcancer, cervical cancer and prostate carcino-mas. “I particularly like the new Siemens soft-ware’s ability to display the curves in additionto the MR images within a standardized userinterface,” he says. “Our system can’t do thatbecause it requires the use of a separate com-puter. And that wastes valuable time.”

Researchers are also using DCE-MRI to lookfor substances that block the growth factorsinvolved in the angiogenesis process. For exam-ple, neuroradiologist Dr. Gregory Sorensen ofthe Massachusetts General Hospital in Bostonhas tested one such inhibitor against glioblas-toma, an extremely malignant form of braintumor. “The DCE-MRI showed that the test sub-stance actually inhibits the growth factor andtherefore angiogenesis,” says Sorensen. “Fromthe shape of the measurement curves, we candeduce the quality of the active substance andthen estimate what dosage a patient requiresand which therapy combination promises thebest results.” � Michael Lang, Ulrike Zechbauer

Together with Siemens, researchers at the Univer-

sity Hospital of Freiburg, Germany (right) have de-

veloped a uniform user interface for differentiating

malignant from benign tumors (left).


Molecular Medicine | Research Cooperation

netic field is 235,000 times stronger than thatof the Earth. By comparison, the most powerfulclinical UHF-MRTs available today have only 7tesla (Pictures of the Future, Fall 2005, p. 86).

Image quality can improve significantly withhigher field strength. Whereas today’s mag-netic resonance images have a resolution of0.1 times 0.1 times 0.5 millimeters, the 11.7tesla system will yield images that have tentimes higher resolution.

“In addition to improved image quality, thismethod will also have a much higher sensitiv-ity. The new UHF-MRT will actually visualizemolecular processes that take place only spo-radically in the body,” explains Dr. Robert Krieg,director of Molecular MRI at Siemens MedicalSolutions in Erlangen, Germany. “INUMAC’s

new molecular contrast agents into the jointeffort, while Alstom is building the magnetaccording to CEA specifications and input fromSiemens. Bruker BioSpin MRI is developing newMR components and applications similar toSiemens’ but for use with small animals —at CEA there will also be a 17 tesla MRT for pre-clinical research.

Siemens is building another UHF-MRT unitfor research on humans in collaboration withthe Jülich Research Center. And the newmachine, which is scheduled to be ready foroperation in approximately three years, won’tjust be supplying detailed images of the brain.That’s because plans call for a combination MR-PET (positron emission tomography) 9.4 teslascanner with which researchers will be able to

was established in 2006, is focusing its scien-tific work on researching molecular processesin the heart and blood vessels.

Building on this foundation, the institute in-tends to develop novel biomarkers with whicharteriosclerotic plaques can be visualized withan MR-PET or by using fluorescence methods.Siemens will supply medical equipment and in-strument-specific expertise. In return, it willgain access to state-of-the-art knowledge inthe area of cardiovascular diseases as well asnew EIMI developments such as biomarkersand algorithms.

“Thanks to this cooperation, we will be ableto access innovative imaging techniques andthus strengthen our technological expertise inmolecular imaging,” says Professor OtmarSchober, who is both the principal investigatorof the EIMI and the director of the Clinic andPolyclinic for Nuclear Medicine at the Univer-sity of Münster.

Schober’s aim can be subdivided into threeobjectives. “First, we want to better understandbiology on the basis of animal models,” hesays. “Second, we must recognize biomarkersand synthesize the corresponding ligands — inother words, substances that dock onto specificcells or molecules — and label them. Third isimaging in animals and ultimately in patients.We also want to compare the data sets of PETand MR to be able to recognize the probabilityof a disease at an early point in time.”

Schober is certain about one thing: “In thefuture, we will concentrate more on preventivescreening tests and early detection. Reacting tosymptoms often late in the disease processwith treatments that are invasive and subjectto side effects will be slowly abandoned. Theadvantages for patients will include very earlydiagnosis of disease, and treatments that aretailored to the individual.”

� Evdoxia Tsakiridou, Ulrike Zechbauer

Today’s most powerful clinical MR scanners (left)

operate at 7 tesla. Combined MR-PET imaging (right)

offers anatomical and physiological information.

Future scanners will offer much higher resolution.

Ultra-high field MR enables physicians toobserve the functioning of individual cells.

partners hope to use this new technology toresearch basic functions in the brain, and alsostudy neurological diseases such as Alzheimer’s,Parkinson’s and multiple sclerosis,” says Krieg.With the help of targeted contrast agents,scientists hope to label individual cells, andthereby be able to visualize their behavior in aliving organism.

European Joint Venture. The UHF-MRT will bebuilt at NeuroSpin — the new CEA center for im-aging methods — in Saclay near Paris, France,and is expected to be ready in 2011. Siemenswill provide expertise for its partners and willsupply components such as gradient coils, high-frequency electronic systems, computers andsoftware for visualization and analysis of imagedata. On the French side, Guerbet is bringing

visualize metabolic processes in detail. Theseprocesses are often altered in diseased cells.

For example, fast-growing tumors have in-creased energy consumption. “PET images aloneare anatomically vague and therefore cannot beused to precisely localize the sites of elevatedmetabolic activity,” says Professor Jon Shah, proj-ect head of the MRT group at the Jülich Institutefor Medicine. “But with a combined, high-resolution MR-PET scanner we will be able toinvestigate metabolic processes even in thebrain with a high degree of precision.”

Fluorescent Plaques. In addition to thesepartnerships, Siemens will be supporting theEuropean Institute of Molecular Imaging (EIMI)at the Westphalian Wilhelm University of Mün-ster for a period of five years. The EIMI, which

Molecular Medicine | Interview

Detecting Diseases by Combining Imagesand Lab Results

Prof. Detlev Ganten, 65, isChairman of theBoard of Charité –UniversitätsmedizinBerlin, one of thelargest universitymedical centers inEurope. The centerhas 15,000 employ-ees, 3,200 beds andan annual budget of1 billion euros. From1991 until 2004 Ganten was founding director of the Max Delbrück Center forMolecular Medicine(MDC) in Berlin. As aresearch scientist,he has elucidatedfundamental mecha-nisms in the develop-ment of high bloodpressure. He has re-ceived many honorsfor his work, includ-ing the Max Planck Research Prize, theOkamoto Prize, Japan,and the CIBA Prize of the Council forHigh Blood Pressure Research, AmericanHeart Association.Ganten is also Editorof the Journal ofMolecular Medicine.


to determine which kinds of radiological check-ups are useful and are formulating recommendations for physicians accordingly.One research focus is the development of cus-tomized molecular contrast agents completewith MR technology for the field of cardiology.

What kind of progress do you expect tosee in this area? Ganten: In the future, molecular imaging willprovide information about the level of risk diseases pose to a patient’s health. For exam-ple, in patients with cardiovascular disease itcould show the level of inflammation aroundplaques, and thus help us to distinguish so-called vulnerable plaques from the more stableones. Innovative contrast agents will dockdirectly on individual cells and show the meta-bolic activities that are taking place at the mo-lecular level. That way it will be possible to see,for example, whether plaques are sheddingparticles that could cause lethal blockage ofblood vessels. Our contrast agents are not yettargeted with sufficient precision to do this,but that could change in a few years. At thatpoint, catheter-based examinations of theheart for diagnostic purposes may become athing of the past. They would then be usedonly in connection with an intervention, suchas the dilatation of a blood vessel. In addition,physicians will be able to use molecular imag-ing to observe the development of tumors,their growth and the effects of therapy. Andthis will be far more precise than the conven-tional imaging processes in use today.

In your opinion, how specific willmolecular markers be?Ganten: Basically, just as specific as medica-tions. Only in very rare cases will we have amarker that specifically responds to a certaintype of tumor or a pathophysiological process.Assuming we succeed, it will take a long timebefore we can use a single method to make adiagnosis that is so clear that further examina-tion becomes unnecessary. That’s why molec-ular imaging must always be accompanied by a thorough traditional anamnesis and acareful clinical examination of the patient. Relying on one method as a medical cure-allisn’t realistic.

Will molecular imaging open the door toearlier detection of metastases than ispossible today?Ganten: That’s what we’re hoping, of course.But even when the tiniest metastases are visi-ble in an image as minuscule dots, that doesn’tprovide us with any absolutely reliable infor-mation about the severity or the cause of the

disease. Initially, a physician simply doesn’tknow if a tumor or an alteration in a bloodvessel is clinically significant, or if the patient’ssymptoms are caused by what can be seen inthe image. To know that, he or she must knowthe clinical course of disease. A snapshot ofthis sort is important, and in certain cases itcan be a lifesaver, but in the field of medicinewe assign particularly high priority to observ-ing the course of disease and knowing thedynamics of a process. And it’s here that theadvantages of molecular imaging processesonce again play a key role, because they allowus to look into the interior of cells at regularintervals. They are also non-invasive, causeminimal discomfort and are relatively fast,which enables us to serve many patients in ashort period of time. They will also becomeless and less expensive in the future.

In vitro diagnostics (IVD) is moving in thedirection of identifying diseases at thecellular level. Could this ever evolve tothe point that it would become more im-portant than in vivo diagnostics? Wouldwe then need imaging processes only forexamining accident victims, for exampleto identify complicated bone fractures? Ganten: No, I don’t think that will ever hap-pen. In vitro diagnostics will continue to de-velop rapidly, and it will increasingly make avaluable contribution to specific sensitivetypes of diagnostics. It will also be very helpfulwhen it comes to monitoring the course ofdisease. But it’s not enough simply to knowthe patient has had a heart attack, a cerebral

hemorrhage, a tumor, or breast cancer. It’s inconceivable that a physician would decideon a specific therapy — whether it’s a coronarybypass operation, neurosurgery, a mastectomyor radiation therapy — without knowing theprecise location and extent of the problem.That’s why it’s the combination of molecularimaging and IVD that will produce clearprogress. The relative prominence of the twowill be determined by the special indications of each case and their respective costs andcost-efficiency.

Could IVD serve as an early warning sys-tem for cardiovascular diseases — perhapsin the form of blood tests to identify riskfactors for vulnerable plaques? The patientwould then be able to take medicationsbefore plaques form or even before arte-riosclerosis develops...Ganten: I don’t think that kind of an earlywarning system would work, because anabstract lab report with various parametersdoesn’t convince the patient. For example, a man who has high cholesterol levels andknows it doesn’t necessarily feel it’s urgent tochange his lifestyle. But an image of the inte-rior of his body, which might for exampleshow his damaged blood vessels, is far moreconvincing than any presentation of the labparameters can be. Of course, we can’t call this an early warning system, because visiblechanges are, by definition, signs of massivedamage. But physicians can often use imagesto encourage patients to care for their health.

� Interview conducted by Ulrike Zechbauer.Molecular medicine, particularly the combined application of in vitro and invivo knowledge, is on the horizon. Inwhat ways will we benefit from the advent of this new, hybrid science?Ganten: In the near future, diagnostics willsee the first real benefits. One important prin-ciple in medicine is “diagnosis comes beforetherapy.” That explains why the major researchinstitutes all over the world are currently focus-ing on the development and establishment of new diagnostic methods. Despite all the enthusiasm about new types of therapy, physi-cians must begin by making a clear diagnosis;and that is possible only if they understand the pathophysiology of disease — in otherwords, how pathological changes alter thebody’s normal functions, and what causesthese changes. Only then can they providetheir patients with optimal therapy. Because of their sense of responsibility for patients,good physicians tend to be conservative withregard to therapy options and don’t auto-matically choose the latest innovations. The preferred methods are those with a proventrack record.

partnership. Has this business modelproved to be successful?Ganten: Definitely. I’ve heard only positive re-ports from Siemens and colleagues at ISI. TheISI is a good, future-oriented project that theCharité would like to continue to work with fora long time to come. In general, I believe pub-lic-private partnerships are a matter of course.After all, any separation of public and privatefunding is an artificial one — all of this moneyis earned by members of society and it’s merelychanneled in different directions. What’s crucial is that the interfaces be clearly defined,because there are always problems in thestart-up phase of a new cooperative project.And of course the interests of both sides haveto be taken into account.

What are ISI researchers focusing on?Ganten: They’re focusing primarily on threeareas: the cardiovascular system, oncology andneurology. The aim is to develop innovativefuture technologies on the basis of molecularimaging, optimize existing imaging processes,and investigate the efficacy of medications. ISIresearchers are also conducting investigations

Nevertheless, there are physicians whoquestion established medical traditionsand try out new methods.Ganten: That’s primarily the realm of univer-sity hospitals and their doctors, who ideallyapproach a topic with the commitment andenthusiasm — and in some cases the obses-siveness — of medical researchers. Of course,they too focus primarily on the patient’s well-being. They don’t regard patients as researchobjects; instead, they implement proceduresthat only they can take responsibility for asphysicians, human beings, and physical andemotional caregivers. This is the kind of out-standing physician we need at the university.

The Imaging Science Institute (ISI)opened by the Charité and Siemens in2004 is the second center for radiologicalresearch in Germany that is jointly oper-ated by an instrument supplier and auniversity hospital in a public-private

The Charité, which was founded in 1710, is one of the largest university hospitals in Europe.


Molecular Medicine | Knowledge-Based IT

Digging Out the DataOur knowledge of the human genome is stored in gigantic databases. New software is now capable of mining this vast mass of data to uncover the key connections, such as which genes play a role in cancer and how such genes interact. The resulting information makes it easier to develop new medications.

Decoding the human genome. A gel electrophoresis

pattern reveals widely varying DNA fragments. This

information can be used to establish, for example,

the genetic basis of a disease.

Whether it’s a PET/CT image (bottom), tissue sec-

tions (2nd and 3rd from top) or microtiter plates

(4th from top), the MIPortal (top) links all data

from pre-clinical and clinical research.


databases with various search and service func-tions. However, it’s extremely difficult to findthe information that fits this particular patientin this mass of data.

But in the future, specialists like John’s doc-tor will have an assistant — the new GeneSimInternet-based knowledge portal. Equippedwith all the available information on a patient,his case history, a description of his tumor andlab results, GeneSim dives into the wholeworld’s medical databases on the Internet. Justa mouse click later, the program presents itsresults: John has a suspicious gene known asPSMD11 that is particularly active.

GeneSim also provides information on a re-lated protein that is involved in the genesis ofstomach cancer. But that’s not all. The programalso tells John’s doctor that there’s already amedication on the market that blocks the sus-picious protein and thus leads to the death ofassociated tumor cells. The program also refershim to a medical journal in which there’s anarticle about a therapy that has already beensuccessful. Out of an ocean of data, GeneSimhas extracted exactly the right information.

Revealing the Right Data. This story maysound like pie in the sky, and indeed the med-ication in question has not yet been officiallyapproved — but GeneSim already exists as aprototype at Siemens Corporate Technology(CT) research center in Munich. “What stillremains to be accomplished, however,” saysGeneSim developer Dr. Martin Stetter, “is a sys-tem that effectively brings together theimmense mass of data in the Internet and canassess it in a targeted way.”

GeneSim’s mission is to bring order into theworldwide flood of data from the fields ofgenetics and molecular biology. In the future,it will help doctors in their search for the righttherapy and researchers in their efforts todevelop new medications. The GeneSim plat-form interfaces with syngo, Siemens’ uniformsoftware for the operation of imaging process-es such as MR and CT (see Pictures of theFuture, Fall 2006, p.56), including Siemens’PACS (Picture Archiving and CommunicationSystem).

The link to such systems takes place in Gene-Sim’s central knowledge base module. This is ineffect the brain of the system, which createsconnections between individual informationpools. GeneSim performs several tasks. It col-lects knowledge, creates links between the datawith the help of mathematical processes, andthen determines which genes and proteins aredirectly connected with a certain disease. Final-ly, it provides an extract of the knowledge avail-able on the Internet regarding a disease.

The way this works was recently demon-strated using stomach cancer as an example, bythe development team led by Stetter and Dr.Mathäus Dejori. For this purpose, they took onthe role of a researcher who is initially unawareof the significance of the PSMD11 gene. TheGeneSim research process begins with a com-parative examination of sick and healthy testsubjects. Gene expression analysis is used to ex-amine the activity of more than 7,000 selectedgenes — i.e. protein synthesis — in 30 patients.

Because in most cases different genes areactive depending on whether a subject is sickor healthy, GeneSim compares the data fromindividual patients to find out which genesdiffer most in terms of their levels of activity.The program uses statistical tests and mathe-matical models for this purpose. “These testsand models look for conspicuous connectionsbetween individual genes — for example,whether certain genes are always particularlyactive in combination,” says Stetter.

The result is an image that appears if youclick on the display: a network that depicts the100 most conspicuous genes as spheres con-nected by lines. The more strongly the geneseems to be implicated in the genesis of thedisease, the larger is its sphere, and the moreimportant the relationship between two genesseems to be, the thicker is the line thatconnects them. At this point, things get reallyexciting. If the viewer clicks on one of thegenes — such as PSMD11 — the search func-tion of GeneSim swings into action and bringstogether the most important informationcontained in databases from all over the world.

The program is self-learning and remembersin which databases relevant information can befound. If GeneSim were only a search engine, itwould probably display thousands of hits for thesearch term “PSMD11.” However, it can also assess the information it finds. Its knowledge basecompares items to find out which items of infor-mation or medical articles best match its owndata, i.e. the patient’s age, the stage of his orher illness and other aspects. What finally ap-pears on the display is a text window containingthe most important information and the five toten most relevant links to articles in scientificpublications.

Mathematics and Medications. Of courseGeneSim addresses not only the needs of physi-cians but also — and especially — those of re-searchers who are developing new medicationsor markers for molecular imaging. Researchersalso benefit from the fact that the gene networkon the display can be actively altered. For exam-ple, a simple mouse click is all it takes to sup-press or intensify the activity of individual genes.

John’s diagnosis is stomach cancer. At first he’sshocked. Will part of his stomach have to be

removed? But there’s also some good news. Hisdoctor is very experienced and was thereforeable to diagnose the cancer while it was still in

an early stage. In order to offer his patient thebest therapy available, John’s doctor looks foradditional information on the Internet and inmedical literature. There are many public data-bases for molecular medicine all over the world

that store the results of gene expression analy-ses and other processes — for example, thenew ArrayExpress and PubMed portals. TheNational Center for Biotechnology Informationin the U.S. alone maintains approximately 40


Molecular Medicine | Knowledge-Based IT

Molecular Medicine:Market of the FutureMolecular medicine is — almost by definition — an

interdisciplinary area of research. Its goal is to

understand the processes that occur on the cellular and

molecular levels in healthy and sick people. The knowl-

edge gained here is used to develop procedures to keep

people healthy, prevent diseases, and diagnose, treat and

cure illnesses. Examples range from DNA-based genetic

tests for epidemiological studies to the development of

vaccines and genetic therapies.

The molecular medicine market includes the follow-

ing segments: disease prevention, diagnostics, treatment,

and patient care. This report examines the market

segments that form the three pillars of diagnostic proce-

dures: in vitro diagnostics, in vivo diagnostics and IT

solutions that support the first two pillars.

Laboratory medical applications involve taking sam-

ples of blood, urine and saliva and then examining them

outside the body “in a glass” — i.e. in vitro. Global market

volume for in vitro diagnostics totaled $32.2 billion in

2005, according to the Kalorama market research insti-

tute, which also forecasts that this volume will increase to

$45.6 billion in 2010 — representing annual growth of

7.2 percent.

Kalorama expects the biggest annual growth — more

than 16 percent — to occur in the sector for nucleic acid

assays. Such tests are used to identify infections, as well

as for cytologic examinations and the diagnosis of genetic

diseases. They are also utilized in the field of pharma-

cogenomics, which examines how hereditary factors

influence the effectiveness of different medications.

In terms of general regional distribution of sales,

the lion’s share of business in molecular diagnostics and

in vitro diagnostics is generated in the industrialized

countries of North America and Europe, as well as in

Japan.

The share of total sales in these fields accounted for

by the aforementioned regions was approximately 85

percent in 2005, with this proportion expected to

decrease only slightly — to 78 percent — by 2010. How-

ever, if sales in China and India continue to grow at the

current high rate, experts estimate that they could

surpass the figure for Japan by 2013.

The second pillar of diagnostic procedures in molecu-

lar medicine includes a variety of imaging techniques, all

of which have a common objective. That objective is to

depict biological processes in living organisms (in vivo) on

the cellular and molecular level, in high quality and in the

most extensive manner possible. Traditional imaging

techniques, on the other hand, depict morphological and

functional changes that are not visible until the late

stages of specific illnesses.

The most widely used techniques for molecular imag-

ing at the moment rely on positron emission tomography

(PET), single photon emission computed tomography

(SPECT), magnetic resonance tomography (MRT), optical

devices such as endoscopes, and high-frequency (more

than 20 megahertz) ultrasound units.

PET is the most commonly used molecular imaging

technique for humans. However, in more than 90

percent of cases, it is used in combination with computer

tomography (PET/CT) because PET alone does not clearly

show the specific location of pathology, whereas CT does.

Various approaches are currently utilized with regard to

contrast materials. According to Bio-Tech Systems, the

biggest market share is still held by the radioactively

marked sugar FDG, 18F-fluordeoxyglucose.

The development of other combined procedures —

such as PET/MR — and of more specialized contrast mate-

rials (e.g. with hyperpolarized isotopes for MR) can be

expected to lead to further progress in this field. The ulti-

mate goal of all activities here will always be to identify

diseases in their early and thus most reversible stages

with the help of screening examinations, in order to be

able to treat them before symptoms occur.

All of these imaging techniques are also used in animal

studies. It is estimated that several thousand labs world-

wide are conducting small animal imaging. Some of these

labs are operated by pharmaceutical companies as a means

of accelerating the development of new medications.

The third pillar of molecular diagnostics consists of

knowledge-based information technology (IT) systems.

These bring together information from in vitro diagnos-

tics and molecular imaging techniques and then use

extensive databases to form conclusions that assist

doctors in deciding which procedures should best be used

in individual cases. According to Frost & Sullivan, the mar-

ket segment for these clinical decision support systems

(CDSS) had a volume of approximately $240 million in

the European Union alone in 2005 — and it’s still in the

very early stages of its development. It is therefore not

possible at the moment to identify the portion of the

CDSS segment that is based solely on information from

the field of molecular medicine.

Personalized medicine can be expected to signifi-

cantly gain in importance in the future. An individualized

approach will involve identifying illness and disease at a

very early stage, as well as taking into account the pa-

tient’s medical and family health history in order to deter-

mine the best possible treatment. Molecular medicine

will play a key role here, as will scientific results and cost-

benefit analyses.

Nevertheless, in spite of steadily growing knowledge

in the in vitro area and constantly improving medical

imaging technologies, it will most likely be a long time

before the ultimate promise of molecular medicine —

catching and eliminating diseases before the onset of

symptoms — is realized. � Karsten Hiltawsky

| Facts and Forecasts

have been offering this GeneSim function on themarket for two years as a consulting service un-der the name BioSim, in particular to pharma-ceutical companies (Pictures of the Future, Spring2005, p.14). This way, manufacturers can con-siderably narrow their focus to a smaller numberof potentially pathogenic genes and possiblepoints of attack for medications and markers.

The complete GeneSim package is not yetavailable, but various parts of it are in operationat partner institutions. For example, the Molec-ular Imaging (MI) Portal at the MassachusettsGeneral Hospital in Boston was developed on thebasis of GeneSim in cooperation with the hospi-tal’s Center for Molecular Imaging Research(CMIR). The MIPortal is currently used primarily

in preclinical research — that is, on animalmodels. The Portal manages the data generatedby gene expression analyses and various labora-tory tests or imaging processes, organizes it ac-cording to projects, and link it together. All inall, the Portal processes information from a totalof 15 sources within CMIR. The volume of thedata processed quickly reaches hundreds ofterabytes (1 terabyte equals 1,000 gigabytes).MIPortal is used for many purposes at CMIR,including the development of new markers formolecular imaging. (Interview, p. 74).

Custom Cancer Therapy. Doctors at theMaastro-Klinik in Maastricht, Netherlands, whichspecializes in radiation therapy, want to be ableto identify tumors more accurately in the future— especially in order to optimize radiation ther-apy planning. That’s why they are using theMIPortal to link images from PET, CT and MRscans with the genetic or molecular analysis oftumor tissues. One especially interesting appli-cation is the differentiation of hypoxic (oxygen-starved) tumors from non-hypoxic ones withthe help of genetic testing. Hypoxic tumors areresistant to radiation and must be treated usingmore intensive methods. Thousands of resultsfrom preclinical and clinical research are accu-mulating in the clinic’s laboratories. But thanksto the MIPortal, all of the data can be systemat-ically combined and organized according toindividual projects.

Cancer, neurodegenerative diseases such asAlzheimer’s, and diseases of the heart and thecirculatory system are currently the most impor-tant potential areas of application for GeneSim.Stetter’s top objective for the coming years is tomake this software the standard tool for therapyplanning and the support of decision-making.Stetter has already taken the initial promisingsteps in this direction through GeneSim.

� Tim Schröder

The mathematical models then once again re-view the relationships between individual genesin the network and automatically change theactivity of the other genes that are influencedby the change. The crucial factor here is that thedisplay also shows whether this changes thecourse of the illness, intensifies it or makes itdisappear altogether. GeneSim now operates asa support system for decision-making. It pro-vides crucial recommendations concerning theareas that should be addressed by new medica-tions in order to stop a disease. The same ap-plies to marker substances. If the gene or proteinassociated with a disease is found, it is possibleto create marker substances that dock onto it,thus making it visible. Stetter and his colleagues

Health-e-Child Takes Shape

Health-e-Child is an EU-funded, four-year, 16.7 million euros project designed to develop a prototype

integrated healthcare platform for European pediatrics, providing seamless integration of traditional

sources of biomedical information, as well as emerging sources, such as genetic and proteomic data.

“The idea is to gain a comprehensive view of a child’s health by integrating biomedical data from ge-

netic to clinical to epidemiological information,” says Project Coordinator Dr. Jörg Freund from Siemens

Image and Knowledge Management, a division of Siemens Medical Solutions. Plans call for the result-

ing biomedical information platform to be supported by robust search and optimization techniques

empowered by grid computing, integrated disease models, database-guided biomedical decision sup-

port systems, and data mining for biomedical knowledge discovery. Focusing on individualized disease

prevention, screening, early diagnosis, therapy and follow-up of pediatric heart diseases, inflammatory

diseases and brain tumors, the program, which is coordinated by Siemens, merges the information

technology talents of a consortium of companies, universities and research centers with the clinical ex-

pertise and biomedical skills of three major children’s hospitals and collaborating research groups. Now

in its first year, the project is already taking shape as researchers from Siemens Corporate Technology

and Siemens Medical Solutions are researching analytical tools aimed at supporting clinicians in their

decision making. Further information is available at: www.Health-e-Child.org � Arthur F. Pease

A mathematical model, BioSim identifies genes

such as those responsible for cancers, and sup-

plies decisive information for the development

of perfectly matched medications.

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Global In Vitro Diagnostics Market

In Vivo Diagnostic Market forHumans and Small Animals

World Market for In Vitro Diagnostics in 2010

In Brief

� The field of molecular medicine deals with

health and disease on the cellular and molec-

ular levels. It helps to improve diagnoses and

treatments, while cutting healthcare costs at

the same time. The three pillars of molecular

medicine — in vitro and in vivo diagnostics,

and knowledge-based IT — influence all

stages of healthcare, from disease prevention

and diagnosis to treatment and aftercare.

Through the acquisition of Diagnostic Products

Corporation and Bayer Diagnostics, Siemens

has brought these three pillars of molecular

medicine together under one roof, making it

the first company in the world to offer inte-

grated diagnostics. (p. 50, 54)

� In vitro diagnostics: In the future, lab tests

will increasingly rely on analyses of the

human genome, making it possible to deter-

mine a person’s genetic predisposition

toward many diseases. Diseases could then

be averted by treating patients with a cus-

tomized disease-prevention programs. With

the help of biomarkers, lab tests will, for

example, discover cancers, infections and

cardiovascular diseases at an early stage.

In addition, biopsies may be replaced by

“needle-tip labs” (p. 50, 54, 74).

� In vivo diagnostics: New types of bio-

markers, contrast agents, and ultra-high-field

MR and MR-PET tomographs make it possible

to detect initial changes in cell metabolism.

It may be possible, for example, to identify

and treat Alzheimer’s years before any

memory loss occurs. In addition, the effects

of medications on the human body could be

viewed in greater detail than is the case today,

and treatment adapted accordingly. (p. 57,

65, 68, 74)

� Knowledge-based IT: Among other things,

Siemens’ GeneSim platform is designed to

help uncover key relationships in databases

throughout the world. Examples include find-

ing out which genes play a role in cancer and

how they interact, thereby simplifying the

development of effective medications. Re-

searchers will also benefit from the Molecular

Imaging Portal, which links all pre-clinical and

clinical data. (p. 70)

PEOPLE:

Siemens Medical Solutions Diagnostics:

Tina Johne, Med

[email protected]

David Hickey, Med

[email protected]

Computer-Aided Diagnosis:

Dr. Lance Ladic, SCR

[email protected]

PET-CT:

Dr. Hartwig Newiger, Med

[email protected]

Molecular MR:

Dr. Arne Hengerer, Med

[email protected]

Pre-Clinical Research, Inveon:

Dr. Antje Schulte, Med

[email protected]

MI LifeNet:

Barry Scott, Med

[email protected]

Microbubbles, Ultrasound:

Jens Fehre, Med

[email protected]

Magnet Construction MDT:

Dr. Wolfgang Schmidt, CT PS

[email protected]

Ultra-High-Field MR, MR-PET:

Dr. Robert Krieg, Med

[email protected]

DCE-MRI Task Card:

Dr. Ralph Strecker, Med

[email protected]

Knowledge-Based IT, GeneSim, MlPortal:

Dr. Martin Stetter, CT IC

[email protected]

Magnetic Drug Targeting:

Dr. Christoph Alexiou, [email protected]

Charité – Universitätsmedizin Berlin:

Prof. Detlev Ganten, [email protected]

Center for Molecular Imaging Research:

Prof. Ralph Weissleder

[email protected]

Prof. Umar Mahmood

[email protected]

LINKS:

Health-e-Child: www.health-e-Child.org

MI LifeNet: www.mi-lifenet.com

CMIR: http://cmir.mgh.harvard.edu

Molecular Medicine | Interview

Tomorrow’sTreatments

Ralph WeisslederM.D., PhD, is Pro-fessor of Radiologyat the HarvardMedical School,and Director of theCenter for MolecularImaging Research at Massachusetts General Hospital inBoston. A leader inthe emerging fieldof molecular imaging research,Weissleder has developed methodsfor detecting cancercells using magneticresonance imaging,positron emissiontomography, andnew, optical technologies.


diagnostic sensitivity. One of the most excitingprojects is a fluorescent probe that could beused in combination with an intraoperativeimaging system that Siemens has developed.This could help surgeons to detect cancer cellsthat might otherwise be left behind. The probeis a molecule that is taken up exclusively bycancer cells. It appears to be generic andtherefore does not need to be designed for aspecific cancer cell type. Once the probe hasbeen injected, it basically lights up any cancercells. The surgeon then uses a handheld devicethat allows him to see the area of interest at adifferent wavelength, which shows any residualcancer cells. The resolution is close to a milli-meter — good enough for brain surgery. It isstill a year or two from clinical trials, but it’srevolutionary.

What will molecular imaging and treat-ment look like by 2025?Weissleder: Number one, we will be able todetect diseases much, much earlier than ispossible today. For example, with Alzheimer’s,we will be able to detect it when the first signsof memory loss occur, and be able to slow itsprogression. With type 1 diabetes, we will beable to detect it when the initial inflammationoccurs and before loss of islet cells takes place.With cancers, we will be able to detect themwhen they are less than five millimeters — inother words when they are still curable. Therewill be a shift toward earlier detection andmuch more successful treatment. Numbertwo, we will be able to tailor treatments to thepatient. We will be able to determine if a givendrug works for a given patient, and if so, atwhat dose level. Today, we do one size fits all.The capability to personalize treatment willresult from a growing body of genetic andimaging knowledge. Tests will be developedto figure out whether a certain drug actuallyinhibits a certain target.

Will all of this add up to a healthcare revolution?Weissleder: Over the last ten years we fo-cused on the development of the technologythat allows us to profile the entire genome.Now we need to create an atlas of what thegenome looks like in different cohorts of pa-tients and with different diseases — that’swhere our Molecular Imaging Portal fits in.And then we will have to figure out what all of it means clinically. But somewhere downthe road we will see a healthcare revolution,and it will be characterized by early detection,personalized care, and some pretty amazingnew treatments.

� Interview conducted by Arthur F. Pease.

What are the major trends behind advances in molecular medicine?Weissleder: The primary trend is that as imaging and in vitro technologies improve, we will detect diseases earlier and ensure thatthey won’t turn into something life threateningfurther down the line. Other major trends arethat diagnostics and therapeutics will graduallybe combined and that therapies will becomeless and less invasive. Much of this is in turnbeing driven by what we call systems biology.This is an emerging research field that aims atunderstanding how cells work together incomplex environments.

In other words, analyzing the molecularmechanisms that drive them?Weissleder: Yes. If you were a cancer re-searcher and you wanted to know what makesa cancer cell different from a normal cell, youwould look at differences in molecules. Butcancers are much more complex than that.

Weissleder: Yes. In the future, an option willbe to insert a needle into a cancer. The needlewill have 20 or so multiplexed sensors on it.The sensors will be able to describe the molec-ular makeup of the cancer in terms of multiplechannels. We’ve all heard of the lab-on-a-chipconcept; but this is a lab-on-the-point-of-a-needle concept. The sensors will tell youthings like whether the cancer will respondbest to therapy X or Y.

What are you working on with Siemens?Weissleder: One project is a data miningproduct called the Molecular Imaging Portal. It is a platform to archive, integrate, and ulti-mately make optimal use of experimental andclinical data, including gene expression data.We are also working on next-generation mo-lecular markers for combined PET/CT imaging.On the MR side, we are working on refinements— in particular the detection of magnetic nano-particles with improved spatial resolution and

peritoneum or lungs, and get pathology-gradeimages without having to resect anything.

How does that work?Weissleder: It functions essentially like a microscope at the tip of a fiber optic catheter.The device sees cells based on the applicationof a fluorescent imaging agent that differen-tiates cancer cells from normal cells. Suchgeneric imaging agents bind to whatevermakes a cancer cell different from a normalcell — things like growth factor receptors orsignaling molecules on the cell surface. Thegood news is that these compounds alreadyexist. The bad news is that it may take years for them to reach clinical practice.

A minute ago you mentioned the abilityto do in vivo pathology. Will there eventually be probes that will be able to deliver the kind of information now available only with a biopsy?

Their constituent molecules change over timeand are related to each other. So what systemsbiology attempts to do is to understand all of the 20,000 to 30,000 types of molecules related to a cancer cell — in other words, itsentire physiology. By the way, this approachhas implications for cardiovascular diseases,neurological conditions, degenerative diseases,autoimmune diseases, and of course cancers.The bottom line is that eventually this field will allow us to develop drugs much more efficiently.

What are the most promising fields ofR&D in molecular medicine?Weissleder: Nanotechnology and related im-aging agents and diagnostic agents and sen-sors. Many new compounds and applicationsare in the pipeline. Optical imaging and sens-ing are also really hot because we can now do in vivo pathology. So, for example, we cannow put a fiber optic line into a mouse colon,

Tapping the Sun and Moon

Voith Siemens Hydro has years of experience with hydroelectric power. Now theSiemens and Voith joint venture is developing another alternative energy source: thesea. Commercial introduction of wave and tidal power plants is already under way.


Wave tank: VSH engineers carry out various tests

here (left). Their work focuses on the Wells turbine

(center, right), which always turns in the same

direction, regardless of the direction of flow.

Dr. Jochen Weilepp has a vision: anywherefrom 10,000 to 100,000 wave power

plants operating worldwide. Weilepp, head ofthe Wave Energy department at Voith SiemensHydro Power Generation (VSH), is working withhis team on exploiting the power of waves,which is still nearly untapped. The team identi-fies, assesses, develops and markets promisingnew hydropower technologies.

World energy demand continues to be metmainly by non-renewable resources such as oil,coal, gas and nuclear power. These naturalsources will be exhausted in the foreseeablefuture, however. The available alternatives areenergy from water, wind, the sun, and bio-mass, as well as geothermal power. Hydroelec-tric power plants now generate about 18 per-cent of the world’s electricity. More than a thirdof that hydroelectric power is produced withturbines and generators from VSH.

Hydropower offers many advantages. It’srenewable, it’s generated without producinggreenhouse gas emissions, and the reservoirscreated by dams can be used for recreation.The reservoirs also provide drinking water andirrigation, while the dams help to preventflooding and facilitate navigation of rivers.There are drawbacks, however. One is thatbuilding big hydroelectric plants often disrupts

Although everyone associates hydroelectricpower with dams, few think of it in terms ofgenerating energy from the sea. “In theory, thepotential of the sea is around 1.8 terawatts,with one terawatt of that from wave energyalone,” Weilepp says. “By way of comparison,one terawatt equals the output of 700 majornuclear power plants.”

The wider a wave power plant is, the great-er its output will be. Indeed, a good locationcan yield an annual average of about 30 kilo-watts per meter. No commercial wave powerplants have been built yet, but there areroughly 100 concepts for their realization. “Lessthan ten of these will reach the market withinthree years,” Etter predicts. That’s becausemaking a new form of energy feasible on alarge scale is a very complex undertaking.

Still, Weilepp is confident that “our break-water technology will be among those systemsthat make it to market.” Opting for oscillatingwater column technology, VSH acquired theScottish company Wavegen in May 2005. Thecompany has operated the world’s first oscillat-ing water column power plant on the island ofIslay (see box) since 2000. A key component ofthe facility is the Wells turbine, which alwaysturns in the same direction, regardless of thedirection of flow. This eliminates the constant

acceleration and braking (and resulting energyloss) that occurs when the direction ischanged. It’s like birds flapping their wings toachieve constant forward motion — and it’ssaid that birds even inspired Alan Wells, theturbine’s inventor.

The Islay facility provides electricity to about50 households on the island. That may not bemuch, but the Scottish wave power plant is stillthe only one in the world that’s continuouslysupplying power to the grid. “It’s the ideal envi-ronment for us to gain a better understandingof the technology and processes involved, andto test them under everyday conditions,” saysDavid Gibb, managing director of Wavegen.This testing has enabled Wavegen experts toimprove the unit’s efficiency. Now they’re plan-ning the first major application of the technol-ogy, by studying the possibilities for a project inScotland in cooperation with RWE’s Britishsubsidiary, npower. VSH and energy supplierEnBW are also currently searching for a suitablelocation for a wave power plant on Germany’sNorth Sea coast. The facility is to have a ratedoutput of around 250 kilowatts.

Power Plants that Protect Harbors. Wave-gen’s facility is also known as a “Limpet.” Thereason for this is that like limpets (mollusks),the wave power plant also “sticks” to rocks. Thename also stands for “Land Installed MarinePowered Energy Transformer.” The facility’s lo-cation on the coast offers many benefits. It’seasily accessible, easy to service and can belinked to the power grid without difficulty.What’s more, wave power plants can be incor-porated into breakwaters, which harbors are al-ready equipped with, thus substantially cuttingcosts. A single structure could therefore per-form two functions, and the costs could besplit. The harbor walls would include small airchambers containing several small turbines,which the team at Wavegen is currently testing

Emerging Technologies | Wave Power Plants


the natural environment, in some cases havinga major impact on residents nearby. “We’revery aware of our obligations in this regard.That’s why we consistently work to achieve so-lutions that are socially and environmentallyresponsible,” says Dr. Hubert Lienhard, VSHboard spokesperson and a member of theboard of management of Voith AG.

Everything from Dams to Waves. VoithSiemens Hydro’s core business is mechanicaland electrical equipment for hydroelectricplants. Established in 2000, VSH is headquar-tered in Heidenheim, Germany and employs2,500 people worldwide. Voith holds 65 per-cent of the joint venture, and Siemens controlsthe remaining 35 percent. “We don’t just manu-facture equipment; we’re also engaged in re-search, development, and consulting services,”says Dr. Siegbert Etter, head of VSH CorporateTechnology. “In other words, we’re a full-rangesupplier that does everything but dam construc-tion, which is handled by civil engineers.”Roughly ten companies operate in the samesector as VSH, which holds approximately 20percent of the global hydroelectric market.New orders in 2006 totaled 720 million euros,which makes the company number two in themarket.

How to Turn Waves into Watts

Voith Siemens Hydro fa-

vors Wavegen’s oscillating

water column principle

over competing technolo-

gies. With this system, the

water surface is covered

with a funnel-shaped roof

(top graphics). As waves

rise and fall inside this

structure, air captured

inside is compressed and

decompressed. The energy

from the pressure differ-

ence is converted into elec-

tricity by means of a Wells

turbine and a generator. A

power plant like this could

also be integrated into a

harbor’s breakwater (bottom graphics). The output of such a facility directly depends on its width,

with an annual average of approximately 30 kilowatts generated per linear meter (at good locations).

at the Limpet facility in Scotland. Plans havealso been developed for a new harbor to bebuilt in northern Spain.

“We also recently began tapping energyfrom the moon, along with energy from thesun,” says Etter. “Energy from the sea is dividedinto wave and tidal energy,” he explains. “Thefirst is created by the power of the sun, the sec-ond comes from the moon.” There are severaltechnological approaches for harnessing tidalenergy. Conventional tidal plants require adam, but tidal-flow power plants use severalunderwater machines placed under a bridge.“You could say it’s something like an ‘underwa-ter wind park’,” Etter says. In a joint venturewith a Korean company, Voith Siemens Hydro

is planning to develop and test such a powerplant for a major project in Korea that will in-clude between 500 and 1,000 turbines. Theproject is still in the planning stage, however.

Power generation from the sea has ad-vanced dramatically in the last five years, butmany issues remain to be clarified, such aswhich approach for harnessing wave and tidalenergy is most effective and least costly.There’s also the question of how other powergeneration technologies will develop. Onething is certain, however. It will be a long timebefore Weilepp’s vision of 10,000 to 100,000wave power plants becomes reality. Neverthe-less, the first steps in this direction have nowbeen taken. � Gitta Rohling

Wave motion

One turbine per chamber

Decompression

Compression

Air flow

84 Cutting Emissions in Half Climate researcher and advisor to the German government Prof. Hans Joachim Schellnhuber explains the dangers of global warming — and what can be done to minimize climate change.

86 Urban Potential A comparison of energy savingsand CO2 emissions — in a hypo-thetical ideal city equipped withthe most efficient state-of-the-arttechnology, and a major city today.

90 Built Clean Siemens’ new Chinese head-quarters is being built in Beijing.Equipped with state-of-the-arttechnology, it is a model of effi-ciency and ecology.

91 Zero Emission Power PlantsA look at a broad spectrum of environmentally friendly solutionsranging from CO2-free power plants, to hybrid fuel cell and gas turbine plants, energy from house-hold waste, and tomorrow’s elec-tric vehicles. Pages 91, 94, 96, 98

102 Going Greener At Siemens, the environmentalsoundness of a product beginswith the development of the initialproduct concept. Examples fromSiemens’ Eco Excellence Program.

Highlights

2020The head of a research institute shows his

family the results of ten years of work on the

development of processes and measures to

protect the environment. Thanks to exten-

sive cooperation between research institutes

and private companies, energy consumption

and pollutant emissions in buildings, power

plants, and motor vehicles have been sub-

stantially reduced through the utilization

of new technologies.


Where are we now?” asks Sophie, Leonard’s13-year-old daughter. “This is our new

hologram room,” her father replies. “This iswhere we show our guests the different solu-tions that the institute and its industrial part-ners worldwide have implemented to reducethe burden on the environment from green-house gases like carbon dioxide. Wait a second,I’m going to turn on the unit...” “Which guests

June 2020. At the head-quarters of CO2NTRACT, a research institute thatdevelops environmentallyfriendly processes and solu-tions, the institute’s directorand energy expert LeonardGrossman is showing hisfamily the building. Theystop at a special place…

The Power of Persuasion

Technology for the Environment | Scenario 2020

do you mean,” Leonard’s father growls impa-tiently, “the clients who give you the project as-signments?” “Exactly,” Leonard replies. “Thatcould be operators of industrial facilities, or ur-ban planners from cities that are experiencingvery rapid growth in many countries. Electricityconsumption is increasing in those cities, traf-fic is getting out of control, and industries haveto produce more and more goods to meet the


More frequent storms, flooding in Jakarta,and the warmest winter in over 100 years

— the last few months’ weather has providedclear indications of the consequences of climatechange. The gravity of the situation was put inwriting in February 2007, when the UN’s Inter-governmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC)published its fourth report (the others werein 1990, 1995, and 2001). This documentsummed up all scientific knowledge on theissue to date, in a consensus view from 130countries. The report makes clearer than everbefore that we’re already in the initial stages ofclimate change, and that humans are the maincause of these developments. According to thestudy, “It is considered a definite fact thathuman actions have led to an increase in aver-age global temperature since 1750, primarilythrough the burning of fossil fuels, agriculturalactivities and changes in land utilization.” Thepredicted consequences will be extremeweather events including heat waves, heavyrains and rising sea levels. The key questionhere is: How intense will the impact of thesechanges be? The answer, according to scien-tists, depends on which actions people takenow and in the future.

The EU has set itself the goal of reducingCO2 emissions (a main cause of global warm-ing) from 1990 levels by at least 20 percent by2020. One method used here will be to reduceemissions of newly registered vehicles in Europeto 120 grams of CO2 per kilometer driven, be-ginning in 2012 (the current level is about 160g/km). California is already the first U.S. state topledge to reduce its CO2 emissions by 2020,aiming for a 25-percent cut. China has alsobegun to recognize the need to take suchsteps. The government plans to budget theequivalent of $175 billion for environmentalprotection measures in its next five-year plan.Meanwhile, Australia is looking to ban the saleof conventional light bulbs beginning in 2010.

Redefining the Energy System. In an inter-view with Pictures of the Future (see p. 84), thedirector of the Potsdam Institute for ClimateImpact Research, Prof. Hans Joachim Schelln-huber, points out that such measures will notsuffice over the long term to prevent sustainedenvironmental damage. “There’s simply no es-caping the fact that we need to cut global CO2emissions by 2050 to half of 1990 levels.” Andat the World Economic Forum (WEF) at the end

of January this year in Davos, top executivesand politicians from around the world called forstepped-up efforts to stop climate change.

A big eye-opener here was a report pub-lished in late October last year by Sir NicholasStern, an advisor to the British government.The experts who wrote the report addressed forthe first time the economic costs of climatechange. The results were sobering. Accordingto the study, a further increase in CO2 emis-sions could push the cost of climate-relateddamages to as much as 20 percent of globaldomestic product per year (see p. 85). At thesame time, however, implementing measuresthat would limit the global temperatureincrease to less than two degrees would lead tocosts totaling only around one percent of glob-al economic output. “This, in turn, wouldrequire converting to a new, low-carbon globalenergy system,” says Schellnhuber.

“If actions geared toward the long term aretaken in a timely manner, the shock of imple-menting such a low-carbon-based system couldbe absorbed by the world economy,” saysDr. Georg Rosenbauer, CO2 expert at SiemensPower Generation in Erlangen. “Last year’s ris-ing oil prices alone cost more than the total

Global warming is leading to storms,

droughts, melting glaciers and dwindling

ice caps. Together, these changes threaten

the existence of hundreds of species.

diesel, which were refined from oil and veryexpensive. The work we did with fuels is part ofthe reason why today we mostly use biofuelsand clean SynFuel from natural gas, tar sand,and coal — and also more and more hydrogen.The big breakthrough that dramatically reducedCO2 emissions from private vehicles came afterwe partnered with the automotive industry onthe market launch of eDrive systems with elec-tric drive units integrated into vehicle wheels.”

“But,” Leonard’s father cuts in, “you neverwould have succeeded were it not for the intro-duction of emission certificates and the taxsystem changes discouraging the emission ofgreenhouse gases.” Leonard has to grin as herecalls his father’s days working at the tax de-partment. “Yes, you’re right — you tax peoplealso played a part in that,” Leonard says, turninghis hand in the air to bring the third hologram,that of a power plant, into the foreground.

“This is one of our new projects,” he says.“It’s a fuel cell-hybrid power plant that directlyconverts natural gas into electricity, at an effi-ciency level of more than 70 percent. That’scurrently the world record for a commercialplant — and also 20 percent higher than whatwas possible with a conventional gas andsteam turbine plant back around the time youwere born, Sophie. So, per unit of electricity,we’ve reduced CO2 emissions by nearly 30 per-cent, and we can separate the remaining CO2and store it underground. What’s more, we’relaunching the 10-megawatt hybrid power plantten years sooner than originally expected, andour researchers are working on a biomass plantthat uses a CO2 separation process, which willenable us to achieve a net reduction of green-house gases in the atmosphere.”

“And how will you pay for that?” asks Leo-nard’s father. Leonard smiles. “Why do you thinkwe’re called CO2NTRACT? The financing will bedone through CO2 contracting. We’ll guaranteeour customers a set level of CO2 savings, andthey’ll be able to purchase emission certificates— and also save on taxes. They’ll put part ofthe savings toward installments running for aperiod of ten to 15 years to pay us, and our in-dustrial partners, for the services we perform.”

Sophie clears her throat: “Uh, Dad?” Leonardlooks down at his daughter. Suddenly, his tonesomewhat suspicious, he asks: “Sophie, wasthere a reason why you wanted to visit me here,specifically?” Sophie grins sheepishly. “Yeah,uh, I have to write a school paper about globalwarming and what we at school can do to helpstop it… I thought — and Grandpa also said —that maybe you…” From the corner of his eye,Leonard sees his father’s devilish grin, thensighs, resigned to the fact that he’s beentricked. � Sebastian Webel

rising demand. Our job is to come up withintelligent solutions to make sure the environ-ment doesn’t suffer as a result.” Sophie seemsto be getting a little restless. “When’s that thinggoing to start up?” she says.

Leonard types a few commands into a panelintegrated in a desk in the middle of the room.Instantly, small flashes of light begin dancingover the top of the desk, before transformingthemselves into large colorful light beams thatjoin to create an image of the earth with itstemperature chart, something Sophie is quitefamiliar with. Suddenly, three holograms appearbefore the group in a triangular formation.

Sophie recognizes one of the images imme-diately. “Hey, that looks like our house!” shecalls out. “You’re right, Sophie,” her father says.“And I’m going to use this image to explain toyou our first assignment, which we carried outright after we established the institute in2010.” “I remember,” says Leonard’s father.“CO2NTRACT was given the job to reduce ener-gy consumption in office buildings. That wasreally a great beginning.”

“Looking back, it wasn’t even all that diffi-cult,” says Leonard. “All you need are the rightanalysis programs to quickly identify thebiggest energy consumers in the buildings —like heating and hot water systems, householdand electrical appliances, lighting, IT networks,and the like. Then, with the appropriate soft-ware, you can determine which levers youneed to pull in each building to get the optimalresult. In some buildings, you might focus onheat insulation and more efficient refrigera-tors, while in others you can install energy-saving lamps, waste-heat utilization systemsand building management systems that usesensors. There are all kinds of possibilities. Ifyou do things right, you can reduce energyconsumption by 30, 40, or 50 percent — oreven more. The same applies to private houses,which is why we decided to build a ‘passivehouse’ for ourselves that would ensure minimalenergy consumption.” All Sophie can say as shestares at the hologram is: “Cool!”

Her father is pleased. “Yes, we were verysuccessful,” he continues. “Now I’ll show youwhat we did about traffic.” The three holo-grams begin to regroup and an image appearsthat everyone in the room recognizes rightaway. “Wow, a gas station,” says Leonard’sfather with a hint of sarcasm, which his sonignores. “It’s not the ‘gas’ station — or in thiscase, the filling station — that’s important,Dad, but what’s in the tanks: synthetic fuel, orSynFuel.” Sophie is unimpressed: “So? We al-ways fill up with that.” “That’s right Sophie,”Leonard says patiently, “but before you wereborn, people used other fuels like gasoline and


Technology for the Environment | Scenario 2020

Global warming is alreadya reality. What remains uncertain is how it willplay out over the next few decades. Will we facea climate disaster,or will we be able to somehowmaster the situation? We still have a chance to determine our destiny bydeveloping and imple-menting efficient, energy-saving technologies.

| Trends

Our Vanishing Options

About one third of the approximately 40 billion tons of

CO2e that are emitted annually around the world as

greenhouse gases comes from agriculture, forestry, land

clearing measures and waste. “CO2e” refers to CO2 equiva-

lents. Other greenhouse gases — including methane,

laughing gas, fluorocarbons and industrial gases (e.g. sul-

fur hexafluoride) — are converted into these equivalents

to show their global warming potential compared to car-

bon dioxide (CO2). Methane’s global warming potential,

for example, is 21 times that of CO2, with one ton of

methane corresponding to 21 tons of CO2e. More than

two-thirds of the greenhouse gas emissions (currently

about 27 billion tons of CO2e) are energy-related, meaning

they are caused by people’s energy consumption. The

emissions result from electricity generation in power

plants, generation of heat, and fuel combustion by trans-

port vehicles. In Germany, about 87 percent of green-

house gases result from energy use, while the remaining

13 percent come from other sources, including agriculture

and the chemicals industry.

Power plants are the source of nearly 25 percent of

the world’s greenhouse gas emissions. The largest share of

The Sources of Greenhouse Gases

| Facts and Forecasts


CO2 from these plants results from turning fossil fuels into

usable energy such as electricity and district heating; a

small share is also generated during the facilities’ construc-

tion and by the supply of fuels. The cumulative CO2 emis-

sions of lignite power plants, for example, are about 1,000

grams per kilowatt-hour (g/kWh) of electricity; hard coal

plants produce 780 g/kWh. And the atmosphere even feels

the effect of nuclear power plants, which give off small

amounts (around 25 g/kWh) of CO2 from uranium mining

and enrichment. Photovoltaic facilities account for about

100 g/kWh of CO2, due to the production of solar cells,

modules and inverters. Wind plants (20 g/kWh) and hydro-

electric facilities (4 g/kWh), by contrast, have very low CO2

emissions.

A look at regional distribution of energy-related emis-

sions shows the biggest shares are from the U.S. (over 21

percent) and China (almost 18 percent), followed by Rus-

sia (nearly 6 percent), Japan (4.5 percent), India (4 per-

cent), and Germany (3.2 percent). According to the IEA,

energy-related emissions will rise by almost 50 percent to

about 40 billion tons of CO2 by 2030 if countermeasures

aren’t taken. As the world’s largest coal consumer, China is

expected to surpass the U.S. as the largest producer of CO2

by 2010. But China’s emissions are still low, seen on a per

capita basis: about four tons of CO2 per year, compared to

roughly ten tons in Germany and 20 tons in the U.S.� Sylvia Trage

N2O 8%

Industrial gases1%

CO2

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CH4

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Forestry14%

Industry (emissions fromindustrial processes and direct primary energyconsumption) 23%

CH4: methane (e.g. from cattle)N2O: nitrous oxide (laughing gas, e.g. from power plantsand vehicle emissions)Industrial gases: fluorocarbons (e.g. from refrigeration systems), sulfur hexafluoride (e.g. used as an insulator gas)

Buildings (indirect emissionsfrom electric powerconsumption)13%

Agriculture /waste18%

Industry (indirectemissions fromelectric power)11%

Buildings (direct emissions fromprimary energy consumption)8%

Transport14%

40 billiontons of CO2e

per year

CO2 EquivalentsEmissions by Key Sector

Major Sources of GreenhouseGases. One Fourth Are NotFrom Carbon Dioxide

5% 10% 15% 20%0%

U.S.

China

Russia

Japan

India

Germany

Canada

UK

Italy

South

Korea

Share …

of total world CO2 emissions

of total world primaryenergy consumption

of total world gross domestic product

of total world population

Top 10 CO2 Emitters

00 1000 2000 3000 4000

5

10

15

20

25 CO2 emissions per capita and year (in tons)

Population (in millions)

North America

2000

2000

2000

2000 2000

2020

2020

2020

2020

2020

Europe

South America Africa / Middle East Asia

Regional Growth of CarbonDioxide Emissions

The size of each circle corresponds to the total emissionsof the region in question, and is computed by multiplyingper capita emissions and population.

Energy Conservation Curriculum

In 1999, Siemens was commissioned to identify and implement ways to conserve energy at 23

Vienna schools. The goal of the project’s ten-year contract is to cut energy costs at each school by

around 20 percent. The special feature of the effort is that, in addition to introducing technological

improvements, Siemens worked with teachers to develop the ENOA (Energy Oasis) program, which is

designed to teach students to deal with energy responsibly. As part of ENOA, teachers and students

came up with energy conservation measures and implemented them within the framework of an in-

ternal competition. And they were successful. A couple of new boilers and some new heat insulation

needed to be installed, but ENOA enabled most of the schools to meet the 20-percent target. Vienna’s

Rahlgasse High School achieved the best results (annual energy savings of 27 percent) by turning off

boilers on weekends, cutting down on lighting, and airing out rooms quickly by opening windows

wide for short periods — all without having to implement a single technical measure.


sum that would have been necessary to mini-mize damage from climate change worldwideover the same period. Furthermore, we alreadyhave many of the solutions.”

Examples abound in areas such as buildingsystems. Completely renovating an old build-ing, for example, reduces by up to 56 percentthe amount of heat required for keeping roomswarm, which itself accounts for 80 percent ofenergy consumption in private households.New houses built using the passive house stan-dard can reduce energy requirements by morethan 90 percent. And the promotion of hybridmotors, the recovering of braking energy, andother related measures, could help reduce alarge share of emissions from vehicle traffic.There are also ways to save energy by conserv-ing electricity. Many appliances can be operatedusing as much as 75 percent less electricity,and energy-saving lamps and light-emittingdiodes use about 80 percent less electricitythan conventional light bulbs (see p. 87).

Another method of reducing CO2 emissionsis to boost power plant efficiency. “Equippingall coal-fired power plants with state-of-the-arttechnology would reduce their CO2 emissionsby around 25 percent,” says Dr. Klaus Kleinfeld,President and CEO of Siemens and, since March2007, Chairman of the BDI (Federation of Ger-

man Industries) Climate Protection Initiative.Looking to the future, Kleinfeld adds that, “ifwe factor in separation technologies, we couldreduce emissions by 80 percent.” Siemens is al-ready developing procedures for separating andstoring CO2. An important step here was the ac-quisition of the Swiss Sustec Group’s coal gasi-fication and synthesis operations in 2006. Theprocesses developed by Sustec convert coalinto synthesis gas, which is then transformedinto CO2 and hydrogen. The latter produces fewpollutants when burned, and the CO2 can beseparated and sequestered underground (p. 91).

Technology for the Environment Prof.Hermann Requardt, head of Siemens CorporateTechnology, describes the company’s range ofenvironmental protection activities this way: “Iwould estimate that environmental and climateprotection accounts for more than half of ourexpenditure on R&D. Measures here includeeverything that helps to generate and utilizeenergy in a more environmentally friendly way;development of more efficient drive systemsand lighting; intelligent building technologies;and the use of energy saving performance con-tracting and environmentally-sound productionprocesses.” Another example is the developmentof a hybrid power plant that combines the

advantages of a fuel cell and a gas turbine.Researchers working on this technology hopeto achieve an electrical efficiency of approxi-mately 70 percent, which would be a newworld record (see p. 96).

Renewable energy is also essential. Vastwind parks already provide millions of house-holds with electricity — and Siemens is theworld market leader for offshore wind powerfacilities. Around one-fifth of the electricitygenerated worldwide is now produced by hy-droelectric power plants (p. 76). And heat fromthe depths of the earth can also be tappedwithout releasing CO2. To this end, Siemens isnow completing a geothermal power plantnear Munich that will supply 6,000 householdswith electricity and 20,000 with heat (p. 98).Energy can even be obtained from waste. Here,Siemens supplies control technology for wastedisposal plants that process household garbageinto fuel for power plants (p. 94). Much canalso be done to improve automobiles. Siemensresearchers plan to use the concept of the hubmotor to place electric motors directly on thewheels. This would make it possible to convertup to 96 percent of the electrical energygenerated into power for vehicle propulsion —11 percent more than what today’s most effi-cient hybrid vehicles are capable of.

Siemens’ portfolio of environmentally friend-ly technologies is already extensive. “The worldof alternative energy is no longer the domainof nature-loving wind power types,” said DanEsty, director of Yale University’s Center forEnvironmental Law & Policy, at the WEF inDavos. “Today, the biggest companies are fund-ing development of such technologies.”

Siemens is one of many companies thatbelong to the 3C (Combating Climate Change)initiative, established at the start of this year bySwedish energy company Vattenfall. 3C aimsto promote a joint effort by governments, busi-nesses, and consumers to convert to a low-CO2economy. “The time has come to act,” says Ro-senbauer. “We can still set course for a long-termtransformation — but in ten years, our optionswill have vanished.” � Sebastian Webel

Technology for the Environment | Trends Many low-carbon technologies such as

fuel cells (left), offshore wind parks (center),

and hybrid motors for automobiles (right)

are already being used today.

Technology for the Environment | Interview

Why Carbon DioxideEmissions Need to beCut in Half by 2050

Prof. Hans JoachimSchellnhuber is Di-rector of the Institutefor Climate ImpactResearch in Potsdam.Schellnhuber, 56,was one of the firstresearchers to in-vestigate the conse-quences of climatechange. The physicistwas also ResearchDirector at the Tyndall Centre forClimate Change inNorwich (UK) from2001 to 2005. Theexceptional value of his work was officially recognizedwhen the Queennamed him “Hon-orary Commander ofthe Most ExcellentOrder of the BritishEmpire” (CBE). German ChancellorAngela Merkel recently appointedSchellnhuber toserve as Advisor onClimate Issues to theFederal Governmentduring Germany’spresidency of the EU Council andchairmanship of theG8 conference. Thecountry assumesboth roles this year.


the atmosphere would be more heavily ladenwith water vapor and energy, resulting in in-creasingly violent storms. Third, the variationin precipitation patterns would become moreextreme, meaning even less rain in placeswhere there is already little rainfall, and viceversa. Just one consequence of this would beincreasing desertification. And fourth, becauseof the greater temperature difference betweenland and sea, Europe would face the prospectof a monsoon effect.

How much would it cost to meet thetwo-degree target?Schellnhuber: According to Stern, we wouldhave to invest around one percent of worldGDP in order to limit global warming to be-tween two and three degrees. His report reliesheavily on model calculations produced by ourinstitute as part of an international compara-tive project. We adopted new methods of eco-nomic analysis, because earlier studies on thecosts of protecting the atmosphere, mainlyoriginating in the U.S., were based on falsepremises. They barely took account of techno-logical advances in the use of environmentallyfriendly energy sources and therefore came toan unrealistically high figure. According to ourresults, even the cost of sticking to the two-degree limit is less than one percent of globaleconomic output. Stern has factored in asafety margin, making his calculation morepessimistic than ours.

And what would be the costs of doingnothing at all?Schellnhuber: At least ten times higher thanthe costs of protecting the atmosphere, that isto say somewhere between ten and 20 percentof world GDP.

What concrete measures can we take?Schellnhuber: Essentially, the world’s energysystem needs to be put on a new, low-carbondiet. That means, first of all, conserving energyand using it more efficiently, and, secondly,greatly increasing our use of renewablesources — including wind and solar power,and geothermal energy and biomass. By farthe most cost-effective method here is simplyto use less energy. The British town of Woking,for example, has reduced its CO2 emissions byalmost 80 percent over the last ten years, saving a lot of money in the process. There’stremendous potential here. For instance, thermal insulation for buildings, low-energylights, low-consumption vehicles, and lotsmore. Developing renewable energy sourcesis, by comparison, more expensive, but it is imperative in the long term.

Are greater efficiency and renewable energy enough?Schellnhuber: Not on their own. In particular,we’re going to have to use carbon sequestra-tion. That means whenever carbon is com-busted, the CO2 must be captured rather thanbeing emitted into the atmosphere. This ismost effective in biomass power plants — thatway, the net amount of carbon in the atmos-phere is reduced. In addition, the operating lifeof existing nuclear power plants could be ex-tended, since their associated dangers are lowcompared to those of global warming. On theother hand, their contribution to generatingcapacity cannot be boosted substantially with-out ramping up the industry to reprocess spentplutonium — or building thousands of newnuclear power plants. In my opinion, however,the gains from extending the operating life of nuclear facilities should be channeled intodeveloping alternative energy sources.

Will industry cooperate in this reorienta-tion of the world’s energy system?Schellnhuber: Yes, if conditions are right.Governments must establish guidelines and set targets. I think it’s sensible for each countryto draw up its own roadmap, and then to combine these into a kind of world road atlas.There’s no escaping the fact that we need tohalve global CO2 emissions by 2050, comparedto 1990 levels. And industrial countries shouldreally be reducing carbon emissions by 60 to80 percent, because they’ve produced muchmore CO2 than developing countries.

How effective is emissions trading?Schellnhuber: The concept calls for trade in emissions allowances, whereby the state deliberately ensures a stringent market. That’sfine, in principle, but it can’t remain an isolatedmeasure. Important, too, is greater use of innovative technology, although it pays to

In his report, British economist Sir NicholasStern warns that the world economy is indanger. Stern says the concentration ofgreenhouse gases in the atmospheremust be kept below 550 parts per million(ppm) if global warming is to be limitedto a maximum of two to three degreesCelsius. Do you agree?Schellnhuber: Two to three degrees — thatdoesn’t sound like much, but it is. The temper-ature rise between the last ice age and the current temperate period was only five degrees,yet what a difference those five degrees havemade for the world! But let me spell out in detail what the Stern Report says. Even if wemeet the 550 ppm target, we will still face a90-percent probability of global warming ofmore than two degrees. That’s pretty alarming.I would tighten Stern’s demand and stipulatean upper limit of 450 ppm. That way, there’s a 50-percent probability that global warmingwill be limited to two degrees, although a 50-50 chance is not particularly reassuring either.Basically, to be sure of meeting the two-degreelimit, we would have to cut emissions to below400 ppm in the long term.

Why two degrees? Is that, so to speak, the point of no return if we are to get a handle on global warming?Schellnhuber: It’s not a hard and fast line,but once we cross it, the damage becomesrapidly uncontrollable. The temperature of theplanet would increase to a greater degree thanat any other time during the last 20 millionyears — all within just one century. Thatwould be a real roller-coaster ride for theearth, an unprecedented phenomenon.

Would global warming that significantlyexceeded two degrees really have a dramatic impact?Schellnhuber: Yes, it would. For a start, thesea ice in the Arctic and the ice on Greenlandwould melt completely, and the ice in theAntarctic would melt in part. In the long term,sea levels would rise enormously as a result.We’d have to evacuate practically all coastal areas; human civilization as we know it wouldhave to be reinvented. What’s more, becauseof the direct CO2 transfer from the atmosphere,the oceans would become more acidic, andmarine life would also have to adapt. Second,

The Cost of Climate Change

According to British Prime Minister Tony Blair, the 650-page Stern Report, which was submitted

on October 30 of last year, was the most important document produced during his entire time in

office. The author, Sir Nicholas Stern, was a government advisor to Blair. Blair himself has defined

climate change as a key political challenge. Indeed, the World Economic Forum in Davos at the end

of January of this year supported Blair’s point of view, revealing a real consensus, particularly among

participants from leading industrial nations, that action on climate change is urgently needed.

According to Stern, a former Chief Economist at the World Bank, if the concentration of greenhouse

gases in the atmosphere isn’t kept below 550 parts per million (ppm), there will be grave conse-

quences for the world economy. By way of comparison, the level of greenhouse gases at the beginning

of the Industrial Revolution was 280 ppm, while today’s figure is 430 ppm — and currently rising by

2.3 ppm a year. If we succeed in limiting greenhouse gases to 550 ppm, there will be global warming

of between two and three

degrees Celsius, the maxi-

mum increase that climate

researchers still consider

endurable. This goal can

be achieved only if the

current rise in emissions of

C02 and other greenhouse

gases is halted by 2020,

and thereafter reduced by

around two percent per

year. That will cost money

— one percent of world

GDP per year, according

to Stern’s estimate. Yet

inaction would be much

more expensive. A tem-

perature increase of five

degrees Celsius could end

up costing as much as one

fifth of world GDP per year.

2000 2020 2040 2060 2080 2100

0

Global emissions (in billion tons of CO2 equivalents per year)

Greenhouse gas emissions peaking–––– in 2015, followed by a reduction of 1.0% p.a.–––– in 2020, followed by a reduction of 2.5% p.a.–––– in 2030, followed by a reduction of 4.0% p.a.–––– in 2040, followed by a reduction of 4.5% p.a.

10

20

30

40

50

60

Strategies for stabilizing greenhouse gases at a level of 550 ppm.

The longer the delay before such measures are introduced, the

greater the rise in emissions until that point — and the more radi-

cally emissions will have to fall annually. The goal by 2050 is a 25-

percent reduction from the current level — with a world economy

that will be three or four times larger than today’s (i.e., they will

have to fall by 75 percent per unit of GDP).

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From hard coal19 million tons = 18%(83,000 t / PJ)

From petroleum46 million tons = 43%(73,000 t / PJ)

From natural gas20 million tons = 19%(50,000 t / PJ)

Energy-relatedCO2 emissions106 million tons of CO2 per year

Hard coal228 PJ 13%

Brown coal201 PJ 11.5%

Petroleum630 PJ36%

Natural gas403 PJ23%

Nuclearenergy220 PJ 12.6%

Wind/water/other68 PJ = 3.9%*

Primary energy con-sumption 1,750 PJ / a(60 million tons hardcoal equivalent)

Electricitygenerationmix

Nuclear energy(average eff. = 35%)

Heating oil

3% Share22%

25%12%

26%

12%Hard coal (average efficiencyat German powerplants = 38%)

Brown coal (average eff. = 37.5%)

Other: Water (3.5%), wind (4.9%), solar (0.3%), geothermal (0.1%), biomass (3%), waste (0.3%)

Natural gas (average eff. = 49.6%)

Industry + commercial 470 PJ = 42%

Space heating122 PJ

Heating oil 61 PJ = 19%

Natural gas 183 PJ = 57%

Heat 44 PJ = 29%

Mechanical energy 90 PJ = 60%

Lighting 16 PJ = 11%

Heating oil 90 PJ = 34%

Natural gas 130 PJ = 48%

District heating 7% Others 11%

Passenger cars (5.6 million)221 PJ = 69%

Kitchen appliances, washing machines 15 PJ = 24%Freezers/refrigerators 14 PJ = 23%Hot water 12 PJ = 20%Auxiliary heating devices 7 PJ = 12%TV, I&C technology 6 PJ = 10%Lighting 4 PJ = 6%Others 2 PJ = 3%

Trucks 45 PJ = 14%Buses 6 PJ = 2%Local/long-distance rail 13 PJ = 4%Air transportation 32 PJ = 10%Ships 3 PJ = 1%

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Process heat198 PJ

Electricity150 PJ

Space heating270 PJ

Electricity 60 PJ

Fuels313 PJ

Electricity 7 PJ

Households330 PJ = 29.5%

Transportation320 PJ = 28.5%

Delivered energy use: 1,120 PJ/a

From brown coal21 million tons = 20%(106,000 t / PJ)

Losses in power generationand transmission, and energyconsumption in the energysector itself: 630 PJ = 36%

A hypothetical German megacity would require approximately 220 PJ of electrical energy per year (= 61 TWh / a). Given the current German energy mix, this translatesinto power plants with a total output of approximately ten gigawatts, which in turnrequire some 670 PJ of primary energy and produce 35.5 million tons of CO2.

Coal 54 PJ = 17% District heating 22 PJ = 7%

1 petajoule (PJ) = 0.278 Terawatt-hours (TWh)

line with low-energy or passive house stan-dards using government funding.

The situation is similar for industrial andcommercial buildings, in which process heatand space heating account for 67% of total en-ergy consumption. Electricity is also needed forventilation and air conditioning systems. In ourefficient city, however, these systems no longerrun at full capacity all day but are instead regu-lated in line with requirements. Here, heat andCO2 sensors determine whether rooms are toocold or stuffy, while other sensors register ifrooms are occupied and assess how muchfresh air is needed. Such solutions are a spe-cialty of Siemens Building Technologies (SBT),whose energy-saving experts search for “energyleaks” in everything from hospitals and shop-ping centers to government agencies andschools. As it turns out, energy consumption inmany buildings can often be reduced by

20%–40% without any major investment innew technology. This is possible because theSBT specialists align climate control systems asclosely as possible with actual requirements.

By employing specialized algorithms, theycan calculate when ventilation and heating sys-tems need to be turned up to ensure precisetemperatures at specific times. Detectors arealso used to determine when rooms are empty,in which case lights and ventilation systems areautomatically switched off. Technicians caneven access operational information online. If,for example, someone has turned up the heattoo high or forgotten to switch from the man-ual to automatic control mode, technicians canremotely make the necessary adjustments.

Miserly Motors. Our efficient city has alsoplugged other energy leaks, such as losses fromthe electric motors used in drives, conveyor

belts and pumps. Motors account for nearly70% of total industrial power consumption. Alot of energy can be saved here by using intelli-gent and more efficient motors. In the past, vir-tually no one knew how much electricity wasbeing used by which machines in a factory. ButSiemens Automation and Drives has developedanalysis software that enables operators to ob-tain such data. Known as Simatic powercontrol,the software works its way through processesat a factory and finds out how much energy isconsumed by each machine — and when. Thisprocess reveals hidden potential for optimiza-tion and identifies energy guzzlers.

Of course, waste heat is also harnessed inthe efficient city. Industrial Solutions and Ser-vices offers a concept here that is perfect for allsectors where large amounts of waste heat areproduced, such as the glass, metal, pharma-ceutical and cement industries. The principle is

Energy requirements and CO2 emissions of ten million people (based on

figures for Germany in 2004). The most effective levers for reducing CO2

emissions by consumers are heat, electricity and energy used for trans-

portation; cutting losses is the key factor in terms of energy generation.

Energy Picture of a City of Ten Million Based on Current German Use

(*by 2006: increase to 5.3%)

How Cities CanSave a FortuneA broad range of energy-efficient solutions and technologies that could rapidly and substantially reducepower consumption in a modern industrial country are already available. A study of a hypothetical city — theworld champion in energy efficiency — provides insightinto how such solutions could work in practice.

Anyone familiar with the IntergovernmentalPanel on Climate Change report presented

in February 2007 (p. 83) can no longer seri-ously doubt that climate change is a reality. It’sclear that burning fossil fuels such as gas, coal,and oil is a major cause of the greenhouse ef-fect. So how can we turn things around? Whatwould happen if we began using the mostmodern and energy-efficient technologiesavailable for cars, power plants and householdappliances? If we could start from scratch —how much energy would a hypothetical citywith a population of ten million people re-quire? It makes sense to think through such ascenario. It turns out that a comparison with aconventional city in industrialized countriesleads to some surprising results…

Consider the figures for Germany, for in-stance, which is the sixth-biggest energy con-sumer after the U.S., China, Russia, Japan andIndia. The country currently consumes a littlemore than 14,200 petajoules of primary en-ergy per year (1 PJ equals 1015J, one quadrillionjoules). Germany has a population of 82 million,which means that a hypothetical city of tenmillion would consume around 1,750 PJ of pri-mary energy. Generating this energy with hardcoal would require 60 million tons per year —enough to form a mountain nearly 30 metershigh, one kilometer long and 1.5 kilometerswide. In reality, the German energy mix consistsof 36% petroleum, 23% natural gas, 13% hardcoal, 12% brown coal, 12% nuclear power andaround 5% power from water, wind, solar, bio-mass, geothermal and other sources. Convert-ing this primary energy into usable forms ofenergy leads to losses due to energy consump-

Technology for the Environment | Energy Efficiency


tion by power generation facilities themselvesand power transmission. As a result, consumerswind up with only 1,120 PJ of so-called deliveredenergy or “site energy”. Industry and businessconsume 42% of this energy, households 29.5%,and the transportation sector 28.5%.

In our hypothetical city, residents, authori-ties, and industry have all pledged to practiceenergy conservation. Heat is a good place tostart, because 58% of the delivered energy inGermany is used solely to generate heat for of-fices, schools and homes, as well as heating uphousehold water and supplying process heat inindustry. The latter includes steam and heat forproducing aluminum, zinc and chlorine. Accord-ing to the Arbeitsgemeinschaft Energiebilanzen— a federation of seven German energy associa-

tions — heat accounts for 80% of total energyconsumption in private households.

Heat thus offers huge savings potential thatcan easily be exploited. According to Germany’sFederal Environment Agency, energy consump-tion could be cut by 56% in older buildingsalone, simply by renovating, insulating outerwalls and basement ceilings, and installingheat-insulated windows. Old buildings con-sume 17–25 liters of oil or cubic meters of gasper square meter of space per year. For com-parison, conventional new buildings requireonly ten liters/cubic meters per year and low-energy houses five to seven. Even more im-pressively, a so-called “passive house” needsjust 1.5 liters of oil or cubic meters of gas persquare meter per year.

It is therefore not surprising that all the oldbuildings in our hypothetical city have beenrenovated and new buildings have been built in

remember that the biggest gains are always aresult of reducing energy waste. London aloneproduces as much CO2 as all of Portugal. Yet itsincreasing energy demand can be completelyattributed to the increasing use of appliancesthat consume power when in standby mode.That can be changed, as every engineer knows.

What’s the short term roadmap?Schellnhuber: 2007 and 2008 are decisiveyears, because the pressure will be on to de-velop a successor agreement to Kyoto. Then,over the next five to ten years, important deci-sions are going to have to be made regardingthe modernization of a lot of power plants.

What can a global company like Siemensdo about the climate challenge?Schellnhuber: German companies have thestrengths needed to cope with climate change.Don’t forget, people used to poke fun at Ger-mans because of our concern for the environ-ment. But our industry can help launch a newindustrial revolution — and even post goodearnings in the process — which will one daylead to a zero-emissions society. Invest now,and you’ll later have the advantage of beingable to supply your technology to the majormarkets of the future, such as China and India.

Where does the U.S. fit into this equation?And do you think it will start to control itsgreenhouse emissions before it’s too late?Schellnhuber: Countries like India and China,which are consuming increasing amounts ofenergy, will continue to point the finger at theU.S. as long as it fails to cut emissions. But Ithink there’s a good chance that policy in Wash-ington will change following the presidentialelection in 2008. The U.S. probably won’t signup to the Kyoto Protocol, but it could end upsetting similar targets. The U.S. might changeas Europe has. Here, many people didn’t wantto recognize warming. They thought therewould be another 50 years to go before thetrain would derail. But today I sense a growinginterest among people in politics and business.

Has the Stern Report brought about a realsea change in opinion?Schellnhuber: The way I see it, years of warn-ings from scientists have weakened those whoargued that global warming was a fantasy.Now Stern has managed to tear down the lastremaining walls of resistance by taking thefacts and calculating their economic impact.His arguments will carry a lot of weight, because when it comes to politics, economicarguments are what counts.

� Interview conducted by Jeanne Rubner.


ment pays for the investment in installmentsfinanced from the energy savings achieved.Such a system doesn’t burden local budgets, andonce the contract expires after around ten years,all savings flow directly to the client. In Berlin,for example, SBT renovated 11 municipal in-door pools by replacing boilers and installingmore-efficient heat recovery and warm waterprocessing systems. It also converted operationfrom oil to gas. The public swimming poolsnow save 1.63 million euros per year — or onethird of their previous energy costs. Perfor-mance contracting particularly pays off in oldmunicipal buildings, where it can often halveenergy consumption. The concept has alsobeen successfully implemented in hospitals.

Putting the Brakes on Energy Use. Our en-ergy-efficient city has also addressed the second-biggest energy consumer — transportation,which accounts for 28% of delivered energy. Upuntil recently, 5.6 million passenger cars wereon the road in our hypothetical city, emitting15 million tons of CO2 per year. That was reasonenough for the city’s residents to start using theextensive and modernized public transit network,especially since taxes and toll fees had made driv-ing vehicles with high CO2 emissions expensive.

The new buses and trains are comfortable,travel frequently at precisely timed intervalsand consume 30% less energy than their pred-ecessors, thanks to lightweight materials andregenerative braking systems. Motorists usehybrid vehicles that store braking energy intheir batteries, which is then transferred to anelectric motor. This reduces fuel consumptionby around 20%. It will be possible to save evenmore energy when electric drive units andelectric brakes are integrated directly into eachvehicle’s wheels. In the meantime, Internet-based information and efficient traffic guidancesystems are helping to prevent traffic jams andfacilitate parking.

Our city wouldn’t be an efficiency championif it hadn’t also cut power consumption. Al-though electricity only accounts for some 20%of all delivered energy consumed in Germany,that’s only half the story. After all, it first has tobe generated in gas, coal or nuclear powerplants, whose losses total anywhere between50% and 65%. In other words, 38% of all theprimary energy consumed in Germany is usedto produce electricity. That was too much forthe efficiency champions, who make better useof primary energy in facilities like combined cy-cle power plants, which today can already con-vert more than 58% of the energy contained ingas into electricity. The energy-efficient city hasnot only increased this figure to more than 60%but also exploits associated heat, pushing the

fuel conversion rate to over 80%. Here, processsteam and heat are sent via pipes to nearbyfactories and apartment buildings.

In the town of Irsching, where a 530-megawatt combined-cycle plant is being built,Siemens is already demonstrating that effi-ciency ratings of more than 60% could soon bethe norm. The facility, which is being built forenergy supplier E.ON, is scheduled to go online in 2008. At the heart of the plant is a 13-meter-long gas turbine built by Siemens inBerlin. Weighing 444 tons, it’s as heavy as sixdiesel locomotives — but has 100 times theoutput. In fact, its 340 megawatts could supplythe population of a city like Hamburg.

Future versions of the plant are expected toachieve an efficiency of 63% within ten years.The implications of this become clear whenyou consider that replacing all coal-fired plantsworldwide with the latest combined cycleplants would result in over four billion tons lessCO2 being released into the atmosphere eachyear.

Renewable energy sources also help reduceCO2 emissions in our imaginary city. For exam-ple, solar cells can be found on top of nearlyevery public and private building. Windmills,geothermal plants and biomass power plantsalso provide their share of electricity, while alarge portion of household waste is convertedinto fuel for power plants. Siemens and EnergieBaden-Württemberg (EnBW) are developing yetanother option — a fuel cell power plant in themegawatt class, which they plan to completeby 2012 (p. 96). When combined with a gasturbine, it will convert around 70% of energyinto electricity.

Saving at Home. Residents of the efficientcity also contribute to energy conservation. Al-most half of all electricity consumed in thehousehold is used by refrigerators, freezers,stoves, washing machines and dishwashers.Purchasing new appliances is the best invest-ment here, as the consumption of such deviceshas been cut by 30%–75% since 1990. TheWuppertal Institute for Climate, Environmentand Energy estimates that replacing old house-hold appliances throughout Germany wouldreduce annual electricity consumption by 7.9terawatt-hours (billion kWh) or 28.4 PJ — theequivalent of the annual electricity require-ment of nearly five million people.

Lighting systems in this hypothetical high-efficiency city would be completely revampedas well. Lighting accounts for more than 10%

of electricity consumption in Germany andnearly 19% worldwide. Given the currentglobal energy mix, that corresponds to emis-sions of 1.6 billion tons of CO2 per year — orthe emissions produced by 500 million passen-ger cars (p. 36). The potential for savings hereis huge and easy to exploit because energy-saving lamps can reduce consumption by up to80% compared to conventional light bulbs (andlast around 15 times longer). So too can LEDlamps, which last around 50 times longer thanincandescent light bulbs.

Some cities are already making the switch.Budapest, for example, has commissionedSiemens to replace the light bulbs in all of its33,000 traffic lights with LEDs. The financingscheme for the deal is similar to the perform-ance contracting model, because the monthlyinstallments are lower than the savings gener-ated from reduced consumption and the elimi-nation of traffic light maintenance. In otherwords, this investment pays for itself.

Less developed countries can also takeadvantage of solutions such as one offered byOsram, which will replace light bulbs in privatehomes with energy-saving lamps free ofcharge. This is made possible by the UnitedNations’ first-ever approval of such a projectunder the auspices of the Clean DevelopmentMechanism. Here, the reduction in CO2 emis-sions is converted into emission certificatesthat pay for the investment.

Energy consumption can also be reduced inproduction facilities, which up until now haveoften been equipped with several thousand flu-orescent lamps. State-of-the-art mirror louvre lu-minaires, electronic ballasts and dimmers thatautomatically adjust to natural light can generatelighting-related electricity savings of up to 80%.

Thanks to the combined potential for energyconservation in households, buildings, industry,transportation and power plant technology, anefficient city could reduce its consumption ofprimary energy and its CO2 emissions by 50%.This analysis of a hypothetical city clearlydemonstrates that a variety of solutions alreadyexist for achieving major reductions in energyconsumption. In other words, they don’t have tobe developed — they could be implementedright now. � Tim Schröder

Replacing old appliances throughout Germanywould save enough electricity for 5 million people.

How to Save and Use Energy More Efficiently

Air conditioning and heating systems consume most of the delivered energy we use, which is why a lot of energy can be saved by heat insulation,

more efficient air conditioners and automation systems for buildings. Siemens offers energy saving performance contracts for public buildings,

whereby the investment in new systems is financed by the energy savings achieved. Typical savings in energy consumption are from 10% to 40%.

Siemens has carried out some 1,900 such projects in 6,500 buildings since 1995, with guaranteed savings of 1 billion euros and 2.4 million tons of CO2.

The electric motor is probably the most underestimated energy-saving lever. Such motors account for 65%–70% of total industrial electricity

consumption; about 20 million of them are currently in operation around the world (in drives, pumps, compressors etc.). By utilizing energy-saving

motors and frequency converters and optimizing overall systems, electricity consumption could be reduced by 10%–50% per unit, depending on the

application. Such investments pay for themselves in less than two years and offer worldwide potential CO2 savings of some 600 million tons per year.

Electrical household appliances: Today’s appliances use much less electricity than in 1990, the reference year for the Kyoto Protocol. Refrigerators

from Bosch und Siemens Hausgeräte GmbH, for example, use 75% less electricity than in 1990, washing machines and dishwashers 35%–40% less

and electric stoves 30% less. As these devices account for more than half of total private household electricity consumption, replacing them can save

a lot of energy. Further potential results from reducing standby operation of appliances and optimizing information and communication networks.

Lighting: Energy-saving lamps and light-emitting diodes (LEDs) use around 80% less electricity and last 15–50 times longer than incandescent light

bulbs. Applications today include headlights for various types of vehicles, displays and general lighting systems. Some 2,700 terawatt-hours of elec-

tricity are utilized for lighting around the world, which corresponds to 19% of total consumption, or the combined power output of all hydroelectric

plants. Switching to energy-saving lamps and LEDs could reduce annual CO2 emissions by about 450 millions of tons worldwide.

Rail systems: The amount of energy consumed by rail systems is already low — in Germany it is lower than the energy required for the operation

of refrigerators and freezers. Promoting public transportation is therefore an environmentally friendly measure. There is still potential for conserva-

tion here, however — for example, through regenerative braking and the use of lightweight materials like aluminum. A subway line built by

Siemens in Oslo, Norway, consumes 30% less energy than a conventional system, for example.

Passenger cars, trucks: Piezo fuel injection technology and hybrid drives that combine electric motors and combustion engines can cut fuel con-

sumption by 20%–25%. There’s also great potential in reducing weight, optimizing aerodynamics, and the future integration of brakes and electric

drive units into vehicle wheels. Telematics and parking guidance systems also reduce the time wasted in jams or looking for parking spaces — pastimes

that often make up 40 percent of the traffic volume in cities. London’s Congestion Charge has reduced traffic volume and jams by more than 20%.

How to Produce and Distribute Energy Efficiently

Electricity production: Every percentage-point increase in the efficiency of an average coal-fired power plant (800 MW) reduces annual CO2

emissions by approximately 100,000 tons. The average efficiency of coal-fired plants in Germany at the moment is 38%; the figure for all such plants

worldwide is 30%. However, technology already available today can raise efficiency to 46% for hard coal plants and 43% for brown coal facilities, and

additional percentage points could be achieved in the future. The best combined cycle plants that use natural gas achieve an electrical efficiency of

58.5% — but Siemens and E.ON are now building one with 60% efficiency. It will also emit around 40,000 tons less CO2 per year than plants with

58.5% efficiency, which corresponds to the emissions of 12,000 passenger cars, each traveling 20,000 km per year and emitting the European

average of 163 grams CO2/km. Compared to an average coal-fired plant with the same output, the new combined-cycle plant will reduce annual

CO2 emissions by 2.8 million tons — more than Siemens itself emits through its own use of electricity, heat, and district heating (2.7 million tons).

Power transmission: Techniques for minimizing transmission losses include gas-insulated lines for metropolitan areas and high-voltage direct cur-

rent transmission (HVDC) systems for transmitting electricity over long distances or via submarine cables. Siemens is now building an HVDC line in

India that will transmit 2,500 MW of electricity over a distance of 800 kilometers to the capital, New Delhi. This HVDC transmission system exhibits

much lower line resistance than a conventional alternating current transmission line, thereby reducing CO2 emissions by around 690,000 tons a year.

Renewable / alternative sources: One-third of hydroelectric power worldwide is generated using technology from Voith Siemens Hydro. That’s 930

terawatt-hours per year, which saves some 540 million tons of CO2 emissions compared to fossil sources. A further ten million tons is saved by 6,300

Siemens wind turbines around the world, with a total peak output of 5.5 gigawatts. Europe’s biggest biomass power plant (in Vienna) provides 50,000

households with electricity and 12,000 with heat. A new Siemens geothermal facility near Munich also produces environmentally friendly energy.

Additional measures: Every major nuclear power plant (1,600 MW) saves some nine million tons of CO2 compared to plants that use fossil fuels.

Combined heat and power — the simultaneous generation of electricity and process steam or district heating — increases fuel utilization in com-

bined cycle plants to as much as 90 percent. In the future, power plants using fuel cells linked with gas turbines will achieve electrical efficiencies

of up to 70%, while in IGCC power plants CO2 can be separated and then sequestered below ground. Pilot IGCC facilities are now being planned.


always the same. Waste heat vaporizes a liquid,and the resulting gas is used to drive a turbine,which in turn generates electricity.

Naturally, all of these measures cost money.And given that local governments generallyoperate on tight budgets, energy savings per-

formance contracting can offer an ideal solution.Here, Siemens plans and installs new technologythat guarantees energy savings. Local govern-

Technology for the Environment | Energy Efficiency

Zero-EmissionPower PlantsThe zero-emission power plant is no longer a fantasy. Filters are becoming increas-ingly sophisticated, removing dust and other harmful substances from exhaustgases. And in the future, new power generation technologies should preventemissions of carbon dioxide getting into the atmosphere. Enhanced measurementmethods and more efficient power distribution are also helping to ensure cleaner air.


A coal gasification plant in Vresová, Czech Republic.

The resulting synthesis gas can be used to produce

fuel, chemicals and electricity — including CO2-free

power generation.

Back in the 19th century, towering factorychimneys belching black smoke may have

been a popular motif for artists seeking to cap-ture the dynamism of the industrial revolution.Today, however, smokestacks are indeliblyassociated with a dirty age of pollution andincreasingly stringent controls. In the process,governments have tended to allow the state oftechnology to dictate what limits can be set.

A good example is dust. As a rule, today’spower plants are equipped not only with fabricfilters, but also with electrostatic filters the sizeof small apartment buildings. Connected in

series, several such units can capture morethan 99 percent of the dust produced. Electro-static filters have wires running along themiddle of steel channels. When a voltage of 40to 100 kilovolts is applied between the wireand the wall of the channel, a plasma of elec-trons and positively charged ions is generated.The former give the dust particles a negativecharge, which deflects them to the wall, towhich they adhere. The filter is shaken fromtime to time, causing the dust to fall below,where it is loaded into rail cars and removed fordisposal.

State-of-the-art filters are produced byWheelabrator, a Siemens company since Octo-ber 2005. Based in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania,Wheelabrator has over 90 years of experiencein filtering exhaust emissions. It supplies systemsto power plants, paper mills, cement factoriesand other industrial facilities. Wheelabratoralso manufactures equipment for processingharmful substances other than dust, such asnitrogen oxides. These systems utilize a processcalled “selective catalytic reduction,” wherebyurea is used to convert nitrogen oxides intoharmless nitrogen. In the 1990s, Siemens de-

| Power GenerationTechnology for the Environment | Building Systems

Working Smart Siemens’ new headquarters in China shows that,thanks to advanced building systems, environmentalprotection and economic efficiency go hand in hand.


Siemens’ new Beijing headquarters. Equipped

with state-of-the-art building systems, the 30

story tower uses about one-third less energy

than comparable Chinese office buildings.

Whenever Taiwan architects C.Y. Lee & Part-ners step up to the drawing board, the

result is a building destined to create a stir. Itcould be a hall shaped like a bronze vessel, anoffice building in the form of an ancient coin —or the postmodern, pagoda-like Taipei 101, at509 meters the world’s tallest building (Picturesof the Future, Fall 2005, p. 15). And now thestar designers are about to create yet anotherlandmark: Siemens’ new China headquarters, a

“The building requires much less energythan comparable structures in China,” explainsToni Brania of Turner & Townsend, a UK-basedproject management company that is coordi-nating the construction project. Indeed, thebuilding uses about one-third less energy perunit of floor space than conventional Chineseoffice buildings. “With the price of electricityrising all the time in China, efficiency is an in-creasingly significant cost factor,” says Brania.

pride ourselves on being ‘the workbench of theworld,’ but if we’re not careful, we’ll end up be-ing the biggest garbage dump on the planet.”

Given these challenges, China needs notonly more effective laws and greater environ-mental awareness, but also knowledge of whatcan be achieved with advanced technology.“Some developments in power engineeringjust can’t be used here; the right conditions arelacking,” Reimann notes. For example, Siemensstudied the economic viability of installing itsown cogeneration power plant for the com-pany’s Beijing headquarters. Yet the idea wasrejected because in China there is still no wayto feed excess power into the public grid. Nor isgeothermal energy an option, because theneeded geological and geohydrological analy-ses have yet to be carried out. “Nevertheless,the country is making tremendous progress,”adds Reimann, who manages constructionprojects for Siemens in China with an invest-ment volume of about 250 million euros.

Siemens is also busy in Shanghai, where anew company building is under construction.With 45,000 square meters of office space, itwon’t be much smaller than the 54,000-square-meter Beijing headquarters. And from atechnical and design viewpoint, the two areequally impressive structures. That shouldn’tsurprise anyone. The Shanghai building wasdesigned by architects Gerkan, Marg and Part-ner of Hamburg, responsible most recently forthe spectacular new Berlin Central Station.

� Bernhard Bartsch

30-story glass tower in Beijing, which will beready for occupancy by 3,000 employees inearly 2008. Behind the transparent facade,often hidden from view, is the technology thatcan provide Beijing with a way out of its basicdilemma — the apparent contradiction be-tween environmental protection and economicefficiency, between limited space and qualityof life.

In addition to featuring good insulation,energy-efficient equipment and well-designedworkstations, the building also boasts an intel-ligent management system that centrally regu-lates many of its services, including fire andsecurity alarms, water supply, lighting and airconditioning. “That makes it extremely econom-ical to operate, as well as very convenient foremployees,” explains Jürgen Reimann, an archi-tect and head of SRE DPS, Siemens’ Chinesereal estate subsidiary.

The building’s control system will receivedata from about 3,000 sensors, automaticallylowering and raising the blinds, adjusting theair conditioning to the climate and brighteningor dimming the lights according to the time ofday. What’s more, offices can be regulated onan individual basis. The sunny side of the build-ing is heated less than the shady one, and theamount of light coming through the windowsis adjusted to eliminate disturbing glare. Oneby one, the lights come on in the evening —and go off again after office hours. If peoplework late, motion detectors sense which desksare in use and adjust services accordingly.

And the same applies to water, which is whythere is continuous monitoring of the waterused in individual washrooms. Should a cisterndevelop a leak, the system immediately reportsit. The building also features several watersystems, with wastewater being filtered andreused for lavatory cisterns or cooling water.

Learning to Conserve. “These approachesare new for China,” explains Yan Shaobin, proj-ect manager at general contractor CITIC.“We’ve learned a lot on this job.” The buildingsystems are state-of-the-art as well. “There’sgrowing awareness in China that high environ-mental standards are a necessity, not a luxury,”says Reimann. Environmental problems arenow seen as the biggest threat to economicgrowth. Today, 700 million Chinese are stillwithout clean drinking water, and 58 percentof the rivers here are so polluted that they canbe ruled out for this purpose. What’s more, thewater table is falling rapidly in about 400 cities.Of the 20 places with the poorest air qualityin the world, 16 are in China. According togovernment figures, pollution is responsible forapproximately 400,000 fatalities per year, andenvironmental damage costs the economy anestimated at 150 billion euros annually, around10 percent of GDP — the equivalent of thecurrent rate of economic growth. “If things con-tinue this way, China will become poor againbefore it has a chance to enjoy prosperity,”warns Pan Yue, Deputy Minister at the StateEnvironmental Protection Administration. “We


plant will not only produce electricity and hy-drogen but also sequester its CO2 emissionsunderground. A number of European countriesare also working on concepts to store CO2 indepleted salt domes or to pump it into oil andgas fields, including those under the NorthSea. This would also increase pressure and thusimprove yields.

But before CO2 can be sequestered, it mustbe separated from exhaust gas. An efficientmeans is the “oxyfuel” process, where coal ornatural gas is burned using pure oxygen (Pic-tures of the Future, Spring 2004, p. 49). Thisprevents large amounts of nitrogen, whichmakes up three quarters of the atmosphere’svolume, from being needlessly added to theprocess and then forming nitrogen oxides dur-ing combustion. With the oxyfuel method, theexhaust gas is largely carbon dioxide andsteam. When the latter is condensed by cool-ing, the CO2 is left behind and can be pumpedunderground. Today, such oxyfuel powerplants exist only on paper or in labs, but two30-megawatt pilot facilities are set to begin op-eration in 2008, one in France and one in theGerman state of Brandenburg.

Burning Everything. Integrated GasificationCombined Cycle (IGCC) plants are already in op-eration. Here, a fuel such as coal is converted,with the addition of oxygen, into synthesis gas— mainly carbon monoxide and hydrogen. Thisgas is purified, processed and burnt in a gasturbine to generate electricity. The hot exhaustgas is used to generate steam. This drives asteam turbine, which also produces power.

In an IGCC plant, CO2 can be separatedduring the synthesis gas preparation stage.However, separation compression and storageof the gas reduces the efficiency by about 12

percentage points. The large, CO2-free powerplant to be built by RWE will operate using thisprocess. As true omnivores, IGCC plants can befed biomass or wastes from the chemicalindustry such as asphalt and even car tires.They also use refinery residues as fuel to gen-erate both power and heat or hydrogen forchemical processes.

That Siemens has high hopes for the IGCCprocess was clear in May 2006, when the com-pany acquired the coal gasification and syngasbusiness of the Swiss-based Sustec Group. TheSiemens fuel gasifier, which can burn not onlycoal but also biomass, petroleum coke and re-finery residues, offers high efficiency and long

Efficient power transmission. Light-triggered

thyristors (left) convert alternating current into

direct current. Underground gas-insulated lines

(right) are well suited for use in urban areas.

service life, and is easy to start up and control.The syngas produced by gasification with oxy-gen and steam can be used either in IGCCplants or in facilities for producing syntheticfuels or chemicals formerly derived from crudeoil. In January 2007, Siemens won a major orderfrom China to supply two 500-megawatt en-trained-flow gasifiers capable of producing830,000 tons of dimethyl ether a year.

At Siemens Power Generation, Dr. GeorgRosenbauer is responsible for business devel-opment relevant to climate change. Rosen-bauer has studied the technical and economicfeasibility of various CO2 separation processes.He says it should be possible to push CO2 avoid-

Trading Emissions & Cutting Costs

On January 1, 2005, the EU launched its emissions trading plan (Pictures of the Future, Spring

2004, p. 47). Since then, installations with high CO2 emissions, such as power plants, steel mills and

mineral processing facilities, may only produce as much CO2 as is allocated in their certificates. If their

emissions are higher, they must purchase additional certificates. Conversely, any plant that cuts CO2

emissions below its allowance can sell its remaining credits. Once a year, about 1,850 companies in

Germany must report their CO2 emissions to the German Emissions Trading Authority (DEHSt) at the

Federal Environment Agency. This is done via the Internet, with a document management system de-

veloped by Siemens IT Solutions and Services together with partners. In a multistage process, the

emissions data from the plant operator is first collected online and then checked by an expert asses-

sor. The report is then sent, complete with an electronic signature, to state authorities. After further

checks, the latter forward the report, via a virtual mail room, to the DEHSt.

Whereas the report itself is obligatory, operators are at liberty to decide how best to manage and doc-

ument their emissions. One option is Simeos, an emissions management software package from

Siemens Industrial Solutions and Services in Aachen. Simeos combines data from measuring points,

energy data management systems, financial accounting, and other company processes into a CO2 ac-

count that helps to forecast and optimize emissions trading. The software also clearly classifies the

flow of energy and materials according to specific products and different forms of energy, providing

rapid and easy identification of potential savings in energy costs.


Technology for the Environment | Power Generation

veloped the SINOx catalyst, which employs thisprocess to clean exhaust gases from districtheating plants and reduce nitrogen oxidesemitted by diesel trucks.

Yet future limits on dust emissions will betoo demanding for today’s filter technology.That’s why Dr. Werner Hartmann of SiemensCorporate Technology (CT) in Erlangen hasbeen working to refine the plasma process,with the aim of capturing an additional 20 per-cent of the minuscule amount of dust notscreened by today’s filters. Ultra-short pulses ofhigh voltage are superimposed on the directvoltage every few milliseconds, which improvesfiltering while also radically boosting efficiency.“Energy consumption is cut by half,” says Hart-mann in the wake of successful pilot tests atsteel mills and power plants. And that’s an im-

Environmental legislation calls for usingincreasingly sophisticated measurement meth-ods. Today, operators of power plants, waste-incineration plants and other combustion-based facilities must take exact readings andkeep a full record of them. For common pollu-tants such as sulfur dioxide, nitrogen oxidesand dust, measurements are taken as often asonce every 200 seconds. At waste-incinerationplants, substances such as mercury and dioxinsalso need to be monitored for daily averagevalues or subjected to spot checks.

Cutting Costs. Siemens has developed a gasanalysis device that measures the amount ofinfrared light absorbed by a power plant’sexhaust gases and, on this basis, calculatespollutant levels in the gases. The device can

levels of moisture, hydrogen chloride and am-monia. Markus says the use of separate devicesfor different pollutants will soon predominate,instead of all-in-one systems by rival manufac-turers. “In addition to being less costly, it’s alsoa safer investment in view of steadily tighten-ing limits. And it won’t put plant operation atrisk if an individual device fails.”

Meanwhile, Siemens has broken newground in gas chromatography. Such devicescan separate gaseous mixtures within a matterof minutes and measure their individual con-stituents with high precision. Long used tomonitor and control processes in the chemicalsand petrochemicals industries, the use of gaschromatography to measure emissions is justgetting started, as the devices are still veryexpensive. The breakthrough here for Siemens

Using ultra-short, high voltage pulses, Siemens researchers led by Werner Hartmann can remove the last remaining particles of dust from exhaust gases.

portant factor because a large power plant’s filterscan consume as much as a megawatt of power.

The plasma also can capture other harmfulsubstances — a fact that did not go unnoticedby Werner von Siemens exactly 150 years ago.Back in 1857, the Siemens founder inventedthe first device to use a high voltage to produceozone for the purification of drinking water. Ahighly reactive molecule comprising three oxy-gen atoms, ozone readily oxidizes harmful sub-stances such as nitrogen monoxide, sulfurdioxide and mercury to produce compoundsthat can then be more easily separated out.The new plasma processes from Siemens offera high level of efficiency at a lower cost thanprevious methods. “The power plant sector isvery conservative; anything new is scrutinizedwith a critical eye,” says Dr. Thomas Hammer ofCT, who is nonetheless confident that Siemens’plasma technology will establish itself, notleast because future legislation will introduceincreasingly stringent emission controls.

measure up to three substances at once —usually carbon monoxide, sulfur dioxide and/ornitrogen oxides — plus oxygen as a referencevalue. The principle behind the device was firstdeveloped several decades ago, explains Dr.Michael Markus, product manager for exhaustgas measurement systems at Siemens Automa-tion and Drives (A&D) in Karlsruhe. “The realinnovation story behind our device is its con-stantly improving cost-performance ratio,” heexplains. For example, the Ultramat 23, whichenables A&D to hold about a quarter of today’sindustrial gas chromatography market, only costsbetween 5,000 and 11,500 euros dependingon specifications.

A&D has also begun offering measurementsystems for waste-incineration plants. Along-side a device for analyzing the infrared absorp-tion of exhaust gas constituents, the productline also includes systems for measuring hydro-carbons and oxygen, as well as a device thatshines a laser through a chimney to measure

came with a legislative initiative in the U.S. call-ing for measuring emissions produced by theoil industry in Texas. As a result, 90 percent ofthe 380 measuring points around Houstonwere fitted with the company’s gas chromato-graphs in 2006 (Pictures of the Future, Fall2006, p. 37).

While much has been done to cut pollutantsin exhaust gases, a solution is still needed forthe problem of greenhouse gases such as car-bon dioxide. In addition to measures for boost-ing efficiency, saving energy and increasing theuse of renewable energy sources, there is apressing need for technologies that can disposeof carbon dioxide from fossil-fuel power plants.

However, the vision of a totally CO2-freepower plant is no longer a pipe dream. RWE,for example, plans to build a 450-megawattpower plant with zero CO2 emissions by 2014.And the U.S. Department of Energy has sched-uled construction of FutureGen, to be com-pleted by around 2013. This 275-megawatt


Turning garbage into energy at ALBA in Berlin. The

facility processes 160,000 tons of residential and

commercial waste per year, 60 percent of which is

converted into pellets for generating energy.

Paper smorgasbord. Calorific value is set by adjusting the mixture of different types of paper waste.

nents together for a turnkey system. Siemensalso supplied all of the plant’s automation andcontrol equipment.

In order to ensure optimal combustion, thecalorific value of the waste used in theHirschwang plant’s energy generation systemhas to be kept nearly constant. But the compo-sition of the waste makes this a challengingtask, as the garbage consists of everythingfrom high-quality blank paper to colorfulbrochures containing filler materials. Foils,paper clips and sand can also be found in themixture. This so-called coarse reject — alongwith low-grade fibers and paints — is sepa-rated by machines from the recyclable paperand processed into a fuel mixture along withthe facility’s sludge. The trick here is to regulatethe dosage of the individual components inorder to achieve the desired calorific value.

The resulting mixture is then fed into a fur-nace by a chopper wheel. “The materials simplydry out in the air above the fire bed,” Schwarzexplains. Eventually, the waste ignites and theenergy released heats up pipes containing steamthat is used to drive a turbine. A generator con-verts the rotation into electricity. Later on down-stream, the steam (which is now under muchless pressure) is channeled into the heating unitfor the production hall, where it is used to dryout webs of new cardboard. In addition, a fluegas cleaning system lowers emissions to a levelthat is well under the legal maximum. “TheHirschwang power plant is the largest facility ofits kind anywhere,” says Schwarz. Another re-ject power facility for woodchip screen residueis currently being built in Böblingen, Germany.

Austria is also home to a third example ofenvironmentally friendly power generationfrom waste — a cogeneration unit in the town

of Dornbirn-Stöcken that is the product of apartnership between I&S and environmentalservices company Wirkungsgrad EnergieserviceGmbH. The facility converts frying fat andcooking oils into electricity and heat, thus elim-inating reliance on fossil fuels.

Siemens’ I&S office in Vienna served as thegeneral contractor for the construction of theDornbirn-Stöcken facility as well as two similarplants in the region, which are the first of theirkind in Europe.

Throwing Fat in the Fire. “We delivered thecomplete power supply system and the auto-mation technology for everything from thepower plant itself to the control system andassociated services,” says Harald Loos fromSiemens. Siemens software controls the pro-cessing of oils and fats obtained from residen-tial and restaurant wastes. Free fatty acids rep-resent the biggest problem here, according toLoos. These acids arise through long periods ofcontact with moisture — and high concentra-tions of such fatty acids quickly corrode steelpiping and other steel components in the facil-

ity’s motors. “But thanks to a process developedby our project partner Wirkungsgrad Energie-service, we’ve been able to hold down the con-tent of the aggressive components to aroundfive percent of the total,” says Loos.

The processed waste fat is used to feed theheart of the cogeneration plant, which consistsof three giant eight-cylinder heavy-oil enginesconnected to three generators that togetherproduce four-and-a-half megawatts of power.The electrical energy produced — and the heatemitted by the engines — can cover the needsof thousands of households. A planned residen-tial complex and neighboring industrial facilitieswill benefit from this power and heat genera-tion in the future.

Those organic cogeneration power plantshave performed so well that similar facilitieswill soon be built in other countries, andSiemens and Wirkungsgrad Energieservice arealready working on the plans. It’s clear to allinvolved that such plans definitely won’t endup as recyclable garbage — after all, the age ofenergy from waste has only just begun.

� Andrea Hoferichter

Treasures inthe TrashYou can’t make a silk purse out of a sow’s ear, butwhen it comes to garbage, you can do a lot betterthan just burying it. Siemens is involved in developingthree pioneering facilities that turn trash into fuel.

Ripped plastic bags, videocassettes, an oldyucca palm, and mountains of less identifi-

able objects can be found among the rancid-smelling trash in the olympic swimming pool-sized delivery bay at the ALBA waste processingplant in Berlin.

But the potential value of the garbage is amuch more pleasant story. “There’s a hugeamount of energy in this garbage,” says engi-neer Michael Blöcher, technical director of theALBA facility. Indeed, everything here that canbe burned can also be converted into usefulenergy, including plastic, cellulose from paper,garden and kitchen waste, and textiles —which altogether account for more than half ofthe 640 tons of garbage delivered to the facilityevery day.

What’s more, even the non-combustiblesubstances have value. These are separatedfrom other materials using a sophisticated sort-ing machine, after which they are sold tocement and coal power plants either as “fluff”(loose material) or as compressed cigar-shapedpellets. In all, the facility processes about160,000 tons of residential and commercialwaste per year in this manner, with more than60 percent of this volume converted intoreplacement fuels whose calorific value isenough to cover the energy needs of tens ofthousands of households. The process alsospares taxpayers the expense of managinglandfills, with their high associated fees.

Control systems from Siemens ensure thesmooth operation of the ALBA facility, which isthe most modern in Europe. “The systems in-clude customized software as well as varioustypes of measurement devices,” says JürgenKnöfel from Siemens Industrial Solutions andServices (I&S) in Berlin. Knöfel helped launch

the partnership between ALBA and Siemensthree years ago, and is therefore well aware ofthe challenges involved in coordinating the op-eration of such a huge facility. For example, asit moves through the plant, waste has to travelalong 1.5 kilometers of conveyor belts and passthrough 25 machines before being transformedinto concentrated fuel. It’s dried out in giantbarrels using hot air, then ground into smallpea-shaped particles, shaken through screens,winnowed with blasts of air, conveyed pastmagnets and exposed to infrared light and X-rays. Non-combustible metals, sand, earth andglass are sorted out during this process, afterwhich they can be recycled for further use. Anyproblems that occur during processing are im-mediately displayed on monitors in the facility’scontrol center. Disruptions can take the form ofvideotape that gets stuck in the conveyor belt’swheels, or overloaded motors in the processingsystem. In such cases, the system is shut downuntil the problem has been solved.

Paper Recycling with a Third Less Energy.Mayr-Meinhof Karton, one of the world’s lead-ing suppliers of recycled cardboard, has beenconverting used paper into high-quality card-board for decades. For the past two years, how-ever, the company has been utilizing waste pa-per to generate electricity and heat at a factoryit operates in Hirschwang, Austria. Using aSiemens technology called SIPAPER RejectPower, the plant has slashed its energy andwaste disposal costs. “The waste processingsystem has reduced primary energy consump-tion by around one-third,” says Dr. HermannSchwarz from Siemens I&S in Erlangen, which,as the general contractor, was responsible forplanning the facility and putting the compo-

Technology for the Environment | Energy from Waste


ance costs below 30 euros per ton by using theIGCC process with CO2 separation before com-bustion. Similar figures are available for alter-native methods, although these are uncertainfrom today’s perspective. While this is still farfrom the current price of around 16 euros perton of CO2 in the emissions trading plan, theadvent of stricter emissions targets, and thushigher avoidance costs, should drive the CO2price back above 30 euros in the long term,making it economically viable to separate andstore carbon dioxide. “Until then, other incen-tives will be needed to make this technologymarketable,” says Rosenbauer.

Second Wind for DC. The power grid also hasa key role to play in cutting emissions. To mini-mize energy loss, high-voltage transmissionlines for alternating current shouldn’t be longerthan a few hundred kilometers. That might befeasible in Germany, but not in a vast countrylike China. To connect the huge hydroelectricplants in the interior with cities on the coast,high-voltage direct-current (HVDC) transmis-sion is a better option (Pictures of the Future,Spring 2006, p. 20).

To date, Siemens has built four large HVDCtransmission links in China, each carrying up to2,000–3,000 megawatts with a minimal loss ofpower. The technology could also be interest-ing for Germany. “HVDC transmission linksmake sense for offshore wind farms more than50 kilometers off the coast,” says Dr. HartmutHuang, Director of HVDC and FACTS Technolo-gies at Siemens Power Transmission and Distri-bution in Erlangen.

FACTS (Flexible Alternating Current Trans-mission Systems) have converter valves thatoptimize current-flow stability. This means thathigh-voltage overhead lines with a nominal rat-ing of 400 kilovolts can be operated close tothe maximum permitted limit of 420 kilovolts,which cuts transmission losses. Gas insulatedlines (GILs) can handle even higher voltages.Made of aluminum and copper enclosed in arigid metal sheath containing an insulatingmixture of nitrogen and sulfur hexafluoride(SF6), GILs are suitable for carrying DC and ACtransmitted at up to 550 kilovolts. They can belaid overhead or underground, making themideal for urban use.

Back in 2002 Siemens built a 550-kilovoltGIL in Bangkok, followed by a 220-kilovolt linein Cairo in 2004. Another advantage of GILs isthat the metal sheath shields almost all theelectromagnetic radiation emanating from thelines, so they can be used in densely populatedmetropolitan areas. “With gas-insulated lines,”Huang explains, “you don’t have any electro-smog.” � Bernd Müller

Hybrid FutureFuel cell power plants are on the way. Prototype in-stallations have proved their reliability, and Siemensnow plans to build a megawatt-class hybrid plant by2012 that will achieve 70-percent efficiency. Costs areexpected to be dramatically reduced by that time.


Erlangen researcher Dr. Friederike Lange studies

the corrugated design to be used in a fuel cell

power plant (right) that will generate environ-

mentally friendly electricity.

Corrugated cardboard has many outstand-ing properties. It protects fragile materials,

and it’s light and inexpensive. But that it wouldone day symbolize a revolution in power gener-ation is something Albert Jones never couldhave dreamed of back in 1871, when he regis-tered for a U.S. patent for two layers of paperwith a serpentine cardboard layer in between.Still, the device on the desk of Horst Greiner, afuel cell expert at Siemens Corporate Technol-ogy in Erlangen, looks exactly like Jones’ inven-tion, only bigger and not as pliable. Of course,Greiner’s ceramic version isn’t intended for

packaging; instead, it will be used for combin-ing hydrogen and air to generate electricity.

Rather than being burned, as in the case ofa welding torch, for example, the gases used infuel cells are converted into water by means ofan electrochemical reaction that releases elec-trons, thereby generating electricity. It’s similarto what occurs in a car battery, but the processutilizes ceramic materials and takes place at tem-peratures of up to 950 degrees Celsius (Picturesof the Future, Spring 2002, p. 50). “In combina-tion with a gas turbine, a fuel cell can achievean efficiency of up to 70 percent,” says Greiner.By way of comparison, the best combined gasand steam-turbine plants feature an efficiencyof 58 percent (p. 88). In the future, fuel cellplants producing several megawatts could sup-ply electricity in distributed systems to individ-ual users and small cities with populations ofapproximately 10,000 residents.

Macaroni or Corrugated Cardboard? Muchdevelopment work still needs to be done beforethis becomes reality. To date, the ceramic stackwith the corrugated cardboard design has onlybeen operated in a lab, and it probably won’t beready for use in Siemens power plants before

Technology for the Environment | Fuel Cell Power Plants

Municipalities will be able to use fuels cells to generate their own electricity.


Electrode Air channels

Fuel channels

Electrode

oxide fuel cell (SOFC) in the late 1970s. “Fuelcell production technology expertise is noteasy to come by,” says Hoffmann. Other SOFCmanufacturers build planar fuel cells withmetal interconnects, but all these competitorsare now having problems with aging after ex-tended operation. For all of its cells, Siemensuses pure ceramic materials produced at tem-peratures above 1,500 degrees Celsius. And re-gardless of whether they’re later operated at900 or 1,000 degrees, they are not subject tothe dramatic losses of other fuel cell designs.

The Siemens cells lose only 0.1 percent oftheir output per 1,000 operating hours andtheir efficiency of more than 43 percent remainsstable across a broad range of temperaturesand loads. “We estimate a lifespan of at least20 years for the delta cells,” says ThomasFlower, head of fuel cell activities in Pittsburgh.Flower is convinced that the Siemens conceptcan be brought to market more quickly thanothers, even if different fuel cell designs willexist simultaneously for use with differentapplications in the future.

Things haven’t always gone so smoothly forSiemens/Westinghouse. For example, plansoriginally called for a fuel cell to be coupled

with a gas turbine ten years ago. The idea wasto burn the residual hydrogen fuel in the ex-haust gas to generate electricity in the turbine.The turbine was also supposed to supply com-pressed air, warm it with its waste heat, andforce it into the cells under high pressure. “Thatwould have generated practically no heat, butplenty of electricity,” says Greiner. Nothingcame of it, however, and in 2002, Siemens andthe EnBW energy company decided to shelvethe joint project for the time being. “We wantedto build a nearly market-ready demonstrationplant, but that wasn’t possible at the time,” saysDr. Wolfram Münch, head of Research, Develop-ment and Demonstrations at EnBW in Karls-ruhe, Germany.

Pilot Plant. The biggest problem was the gasturbine. In the low-output category of 200–300kilowatts, there was no suitable model on themarket at the time, and developing a new tur-bine would have cost about 15 million euros. Soit was a stroke of luck two years ago when theGerman Aerospace Center (DLR) — in coopera-tion with the Institute for Aviation Drive Systemsat the University of Stuttgart — offered toenhance the control system for coupling gas

turbines with fuel cells on the basis of a 100-kilo-watt micro gas turbine from an Italian manufac-turer. The only condition was that a fuel cellmanufacturer and a power supply company par-ticipate in the project.

“We contacted Siemens again and quicklyagreed that we should join forces,” Münch re-calls. EnBW plans to use the efficient powerplant especially to help industrial companies andlocal utilities generate electricity for their ownneeds, with EnBW operating the plants and act-ing as an energy services provider.

a partnership with local utility and the energysupplier E.ON; the other two will be used inTokyo and Fairbanks, Alaska. At the Siemenssubsidiary TurboCare in Turin, Italy, a next-generation power plant will be built in 2008.

There, the material to be used will be moreconductive. It will generate 150 kilowatts ofpower at over 47-percent efficiency and be justas compact as the other units. In parallel, se-lected customers will be using small units pro-ducing five kilowatts each. Two supply electricityto Deutsche Telekom buildings in Steinfurt and

2012. At the moment, ceramic fuel cell partslook like giant gray pieces of macaroni. Greinerplaces several of these tubes next to and on topof one another and explains why this is not anoptimal shape. “There’s too much empty spacein between,” he says. Pressing the tubes flatensures better use of available space, while in-serting transverse connections to create a deltashape and setting up several layers inevitablyresults in a construction similar to corrugatedcardboard. This shape offers optimal spatialutilization and maximum space for hydrogen-air exchange. This “delta design” results in more

than double the output of a cylinder-shapedcell — and also requires less space. Dependingon stack design, power densities up to 600 milli-watts per cubic centimeter can be achieved.

The ceramic tubes have also proved thatthey can reliably produce electricity. One 100-kilowatt plant currently located in Turin, Italy,has already been operating for 32,000 hours.Other plants have been generating power inthe Netherlands for two years, and in Essen,Germany, for six months. “We’ve achieved 99.5percent availability with our facility,” reports Dr.Joachim Hoffmann, director of the StationaryFuel Cell Program at Siemens Power Genera-tion in Nuremberg. That’s not bad for a tech-nology which everybody attests high efficiencybut not the highest reliability.

The reliability issue is indeed a serious one,according to Hoffmann, who says many com-petitors failed with their fuel cells because theunits functioned in the lab but not under tougheveryday conditions. Some companies havegiven up — but not Siemens. As early as 40years ago, fuel cell experts at Westinghouse inPittsburgh, Pennsylvania (acquired by Siemensin 1997) were studying materials suitable forfuel cells, eventually building the very first solid

still too soon to say if the 70-percent electricalefficiency target will be realized with the combi-nation, but ceramic cells with the corrugateddesign will be used for the project.

Power for Pittsburgh’s Botanic Gardens.Experience has shown that trying to achievetoo many fuel cell advances simultaneously is aflawed approach. That’s why Siemens alsoplans to build smaller fuel cell plants withoutgas turbines to gain additional operational ex-perience. Three such plants, each with an out-put of 125 kilowatts, will go on line in 2007.One has already been built in Hanover, through

The new schedule is tight. DLR plans to con-duct a simulation in 2008 to determine if thefuel cells and gas turbine work well in tandembefore linking the components in 2009. The sys-tem will then be optimized, and EnBW will put ademonstration plant into operation in its net-work in 2012. That plant will produce two tofour megawatts of electricity, with the fuel cellaccounting for about 75 percent of that total. It’s

Bonn; three are in operation in the U.S., includingone at the Pittsburgh Botanic Gardens, where aunit is supplying power for regulating the tem-perature in the Tropical Rain Forest House.

Also on the agenda are alternative fuel cellsthat use biogas and sewage gas, free byprod-ucts from water treatment facilities. Hybrid fuelcell power plants can be operated with a varietyof fuels. A current project in the U.S., for exam-

Lowering Emissions Automakers and governments want to get pollutants off the road. Solutions from Siemens are helping by making combustion engines cleaner and improving hybrid cars — the forerunners of fully electric vehicles. Siemens engineers arealso developing technologies to make trains and ships run cleaner.


High-speed hybrid. This Mercedes sports coupé test

car offers fuel savings of more than 25 percent

without sacrificing driving performance. The vehicle

goes from zero to 100 km/h in under seven seconds.

Air quality is extremely important — but it’sbeing endangered by gases like carbon

monoxide and nitrogen oxides, which cancause respiratory problems such as asthma andbronchitis. Some 60 percent of these harmfulgases are produced by motor vehicles — rea-son enough for European legislators to takeaction by further toughening the Euro 4 emis-sion standard. In September 2009 the Euro 5standard will go into effect for new cars, requir-ing automakers to lower emissions of hydro-carbons and nitrogen oxides from the currentlevel of 300 milligrams per kilometer driven to230 mg/km. This will be followed in 2014 byEuro 6, which will require a further 27 percentreduction in emissions, to 170 mg/km.

Motor vehicles also play a key role in emis-sions of the greenhouse gas carbon dioxide.One-fifth of all CO2 emissions come from motorvehicles, whose number worldwide could in-crease to more than two billion by 2030. TheEU Commission has therefore decided to limitthe CO2 emissions of new vehicles sold inEurope to 120 grams per kilometer by 2012(about 25 percent lower than current levels).By improving automobile technology, auto-makers are supposed to achieve 130 grams ofCO2 per kilometer. Other measures such as the

admixture of biofuels should bring a further10 g / km reduction. A similar reduction around20 percent is being targeted by countries suchas the U.S. The final result of the process couldbe zero-emission vehicles, a goal companieslike Siemens are already working on.

From Hybrids to Electrics. Siemens VDO (SV)recently presented a forward-looking project inthe form of a demonstration vehicle with a hy-brid drive system. Experts from VDO in Regens-burg combined the combustion engine in a Mer-cedes C 230 K sports coupé with an electric driveunit (see Pictures of the Future, Spring 2006,p. 41). The engine and the electric motor, whichhave roughly the same output, are operated viaan integrated powertrain management systemthat either links them or runs them separately,depending on the driving situation. Switch-overs between the two are hardly noticeable.

Equipped with a lithium-ion battery, theelectric motor has an output of some 75 kilo-watts, which accelerates the vehicle from zeroto 100 km/h in just under seven seconds.Developers had to make extensive adjustmentsto the engine and transmission managementsystems to combine the two drives via an elec-tronically controlled clutch. The electric motor’s

high output is made possible by adding a trac-tion network that operates with 380 volts ofelectricity to the 14-volt onboard network.

The developers were quite successful. Mea-surements show that this full hybrid conceptreduces fuel consumption by more than 25percent as compared to a conventional drivesystem, and also produces correspondinglylower emissions. The high demand for hybridsin the U.S. and Japan demonstrates that suchvehicles have a bright future. Around 90 per-cent of all full hybrid vehicles are sold in thosemarkets, which is one of the reasons why SVacquired the Electric Drives division of BallardPower Systems in Dearborn, Michigan, at theend of 2006. Siemens plans to transform thedivision into a development center for powerelectronics, motor design and electric drive sys-tems for hybrid and fuel cell vehicles.

However, hybrids are viewed as only an in-terim solution on the road to the drive systemof the future, as Dr. Klaus Egger, member ofthe SV Managing Board, explains: “We believethe electric motor is the long-term drive-systemsolution that will meet the most stringent emis-sion limits.” The Siemens hub motor conceptwould actually have four electric motors pow-ering the cars of the future — one inside each

| Transportation

Earth, Fire, Wind and Water

Siemens has a long tradition of developing sources of power for the future.

Back in 1978, the company supplied the generators for the world’s biggest

hydroelectric power plant, in Itaipú (between Brazil and Paraguay). Today,

Siemens is a leader in many types of renewable energy systems. In the field of

wind power, the first turbine in 1979 had an output of 22 kilowatts; today the

biggest Siemens turbines produce 3.6 megawatts (MW) of power and have

efficiency ratings of up to 45 percent. About 6,300 Siemens wind power units

with a total output of 5,500 MW are currently in operation worldwide. In the

U.S. alone, the Power Generation (PG) Group has received orders to date for

wind power projects with a total output of 1,400 MW, including 70 turbines

generating 161 MW of power in Texas and several wind farms with a total out-

put of 600 MW in Florida. The situation is similar in the UK, where Siemens will

install 140 wind turbines near Glasgow by 2009. The turbines will produce 322 MW of power for up

to 200,000 households. Siemens is also the world market leader for offshore wind farms. PG’s current

110-MW Lillgrund project in the Öresund strait will soon be Sweden’s biggest offshore wind farm.

Meanwhile, the oceans themselves are slated to play an increasingly crucial role in the renewable

energy sector. The Voith Siemens Hydro joint venture, for example, not only develops powerful tur-

bines and generators for hydroelectric plants, but also plans to harness the power of ocean waves. The

world’s first test facility in this field is already supplying power to 200 households in Scotland (p. 76).

Still in its infancy in Germany, geothermal power generation taps into the nearly inexhaustible re-

serves of heat from the earth. Here, hot water from rock formations several kilometers underground

is pumped into a vaporizer, where a special device converts it into steam that is used to drive a turbine

and a generator, producing electricity free of CO2 (see Pictures of the Future, Spring 2004, p. 53, and

Spring 2006, p. 16). Siemens is now building the world’s most modern power plant of this type near

Munich. The facility will have an output of 3.4 MW, and in the summer of 2007 it will begin providing

up to 6,000 households with electricity and 20,000 households with heat.

Biomass power plants are CO2-neutral. They burn organic products like wood and waste, and release

only the amount of CO2 that plants absorbed while growing. A particularly impressive high-perform-

ance biomass heating plant in Vienna produces 24 MW of electrical energy for 50,000 households

and 37 MW of district heat for 12,000 households. Siemens’ portfolio of renewable energy sources

also, of course, includes solar power. The company stopped developing solar cells in 2001 when it sold

Siemens Solar to Shell, but it does supply solar technology. For instance, it is providing steam turbines

for Nevada Solar One, a solar-thermal plant whose collectors cover an area of one square kilometer.

The collectors focus sunlight and reflect the concentrated energy onto steel pipes filled with heat-

transfer oil, which is then used to heat water in a heat exchanger. The resulting steam drives a 64-MW

Siemens turbine. When it goes on line this summer, the facility will supply about 40,000 households

with electricity. � Sebastian Webel


ple, involves a hybrid plant that will run on coalgas, whereby the carbon dioxide will beseparated from the coal before it is burned.Siemens engineers say this CO2 separation willlead to only a five-percent loss in efficiency; thesame process in a conventional coal-fired plantwould decrease efficiency by around ten percent.

Financial Hurdles. ”If a hybrid plant is eco-nomical and functions reliably from a technicalstandpoint, then its technology has a goodchance of making it to market,” says Münch.Customers are interested in distributed systemswith a high electricity output and low emis-sions, but the decisive factor is cost.

The fuel cell sector is getting a big boostfrom the Fuel Cell Initiative, which includes allmajor German energy suppliers and fuel cellmanufacturers, as well as the German EnergyAgency. Long-term funding has also been pro-vided by the German Ministry of Economicsand the EU. Siemens has invested 30 millioneuros of its own funds and external funding infuel cell research in Erlangen. This sum doesn’tinclude Siemens’ activities in Pittsburgh sup-ported by the U.S. Department of Energy.

If preliminary work is successful, hybrid fuelcell technology could be on the market tenyears earlier than expected. Competitors in thisfield have erred in the past by launching verycostly systems before they were ready. Indeed,today a fuel cell plant from Siemens would alsobe too expensive now; the manufacturingprocesses, such as those for cell production,still aren’t cost-optimized. And there’s still lotsof precision work to be done, which continuesto drive up costs, says Hoffmann. Nevertheless,automated production should bring costsdown to a reasonable level by 2012. Hoffmannis optimistic. “The general trend toward consis-tently rising energy prices plays right into ourhands,” he says. � Bernd Müller

Technology for the Environment | Fuel Cell Power Plants

Natural gas Fuel cell

605 °C

275 °C 645 °C

220 °C

950 °C

Heat exchangerGas turbine

Compressor

Combustionchamber

Gen-erator

Exhaust air, residual gas

Air intake

Exhaust gas

Approx. 3 MWpower

Grid

Scheduled to go on line in 2012, this hybrid power

plant (left) achieves an electrical efficiency of around

70 percent, thanks to combustion of residual hydro-

gen in a gas turbine, as well as other improvements.


den on downstream exhaust gas treatmentsystems. “We’ll still need catalytic convertersand filters in the future, though,” says WolfgangMaus, managing director of filter manufacturerEmitec, a joint venture of Siemens and Britishautomotive supplier GKN. That’s because of thenanometer-sized particulates in the exhaust,which are a health hazard. These diesel particu-lates can be removed with a filter from Emitec,which is installed behind a conventional oxida-tion catalytic converter and works as follows:The exhaust gas stream is sent through a metalfleece, where the nitrogen dioxide in the gas re-leases an oxygen atom that converts the carbonin the particulates into carbon monoxide. This

Cars today are already equipped with sen-sors (e.g. in ABS and ESP systems) that registerwhen the vehicle skids or brakes abruptly. Inthe future, sensors could send this informationto vehicles behind them, enabling drivers toreact in time. Such a communication systemcould be implemented via a spontaneouslygenerated radio network using broadbandWLAN technology (see also page 38). “We wantto make such ad hoc networks more stable andsecure,” says Dr. Christian Schwingenschlöglfrom Siemens Corporate Technology in Munich.Because these WLAN networks have a trans-mission range of only 200 to 300 meters, thecars within range must process the data they

cent of its material has to be disposed of, whilethe remainder can be recycled.

Black Sheep on the High Seas. Maritimeshipping is a black sheep when it comes to airpollution. According to the World Health Orga-nization, emissions of pollutants such as sulfurdioxide and nitrogen oxides generated by ship-ping will exceed those from all other sources inthe transport sector by 2020 if no countermea-sures are taken. Maritime shipping is alreadythe largest single source of sulfur dioxide emis-sions in Europe, according to the EuropeanCommission. For this reason, the EU estab-lished limits in 2005 in order to reduce sulfurdioxide emissions in the North Sea, Baltic Seaand English Channel by over 500,000 tons peryear. Emission levels remain high nevertheless.For example, the new sulfur limit for ship dieselis 15,000 ppm (parts per million), while thenew limit for motor vehicle gasoline that wentinto effect in 2007 is only 10 ppm.

Kay Tigges, a marine specialist at SiemensIndustrial Solutions and Services in Hamburg,believes that energy conservation is the bestway to reuse ship emissions. To this end, I&Shas developed a system in which the gas emis-sions from ships previously released throughsmokestacks are used to create steam thatdrives a turbine. The resulting electrical outputof up to seven megawatts is used for onboardelectronic systems. This waste heat recoverysystem was first installed in the Danish con-tainer ship Gudrun Maersk in 2005. It hasproved to be effective. The conventional diesel-operated onboard generators are now usedless often, thus reducing fuel consumption byup to 12 percent and lowering carbon and sul-fur dioxide emissions as well. Last but not least,like all energy-saving systems, the waste heatrecovery system ultimately also saves money,which encourages companies to invest in thenew equipment and products. � Rolf Sterbak

Recycling energy. A new subway train in Oslo (left)

reintroduces braking energy into the power grid. Ex-

haust gases from the Gudrun Maersk (right)

generate up to seven megawatts of electricity.

Whether in cars, trains or ships — new technologieswill significantly reduce emissions in the future.

then burns together with additional oxygen toform carbon dioxide. In this manner the filtereliminates around 80 percent of the particu-lates measuring less than 100 nanometers indiameter.

WLAN on the highway. Emissions from mo-tor vehicles can also be lowered by preventingsituations like traffic jams, which needlessly re-lease exhaust gases into the atmosphere. “Wecan’t do much about traffic density, but we canprevent traffic from coming to a stop due tojams and accidents,” says Dr. Abdelkarim Bel-houla, a developer at SV in Wetzlar. For exam-ple, vehicles that warn each other in a timelymanner about ice, rain and traffic congestioncould help prevent rear-end collisions and jams.Automakers and suppliers therefore estab-lished a Car-to-Car Communication Consortiumin 2004 to define standards for communicationbetween vehicles.

receive within seconds. “That’s why we’re alsooptimizing the software so as to accelerate theestablishment of the connection and the vehiclesystems’ reaction time,” he adds. The WLANstandard is expected to be ready for use in 2008.

Siemens developers don’t only want tomake road traffic more environmentallyfriendly; they also believe there’s potential toreduce energy consumption in rail systems. Tothis end, Walter Struckl from Siemens Trans-portation Systems in Vienna worked togetherwith three colleagues to reduce energy con-sumption by approximately 30 percent on anew subway train in Oslo, Norway. For thisachievement, they received the Siemens Envi-ronmental Award (see p. 102). The new trainreintroduces back into the power grid the en-ergy generated by braking when it enters sub-way stations. The rail car bodies are made oflightweight aluminum. Moreover, when thetrain is taken out of service, only some five per-


Technology for the Environment | Environmentally Friendly Transportation

wheel. This system converts up to 96 percentof generated electrical energy into power to pro-pel the vehicle, which makes it very efficient.By comparison, full hybrids will use around 85percent of available energy under optimal con-ditions, while combustion engines like gasolineand diesel engines convert at most only around50 percent of the energy in their fuels.

In summer 2006, SV engineers launched adevelopment they named the eCorner Module.This new drive system concept, which uses elec-trical and electronic systems exclusively, inte-grates not only the electric motor directly insidethe wheels but also the steering, damping andbraking systems. This frees up space beneath

the hood and eliminates the need for many at-tached parts in the steering column, brakes andtransmission. It thus opens up nearly limitlesspossibilities for automotive design. The first stepon the path to the hub motor will be the elec-tronic wedge brake that is expected to go intomass production at the end of 2010 (see Picturesof the Future, Fall 2005, p. 41). Pure drive-by-wire vehicles, in which mechanical parts arereplaced by electronic systems, won’t be readyfor mass production until 2022 at the earliest.

Achieving Optimal Fuel Combustion. In thenear future, automotive experts will also furtheroptimize conventional combustion engines in

terms of output, fuel economy and emissions.The goal is to achieve optimal fuel combustionthrough electronically controlled injection sys-tems. High-speed piezo technology invented bySiemens enables injection valves to inject fuelinto the engine cylinder in up to four differentlysized portions within just one power stroke(see Pictures of the Future, Fall 2005, p. 102).

SV launched mass production of piezo directinjection systems for diesel engines in 2000,and for gasoline engines in 2006. Very fine fuelatomization and multiple injections now makethe combustion of air-fuel mixtures more effi-cient than ever before. Gasoline engines withpiezo systems consume up to 20 percent lessfuel than those with intake manifold injection.To improve energy management, researchersat Siemens Corporate Technology are develop-ing learning systems capable of further reduc-ing fuel consumption.

These measures will also reduce nitrogenoxide and carbon particulate emissions fromthe engine, which in turn will reduce the bur-Thanks to several fuel injections per power stroke, Piezo technology lowers fuel consumption by up to 20%.

Drive system of the future. The eCorner Module

(above) puts an electric motor inside every wheel.

Technology for the Environment | Product Development

Going Greener

Environmental protection pays off — especially when life cycle costs and economic effects are takeninto consideration from the start. The products thatresult are a boon to nature and help ensure businesssuccess — as demonstrated by examples fromSiemens’ Eco Excellence Program.


Economical hybrid drive. The diesel-electric drive systems in mobile container

cranes reduce fuel consumption and emissions by approximately 50 percent.

Light computer tomograph. The Somatom Definition (also above) has only 19 kilo-

grams of lead inside — that’s 80 percent less than the previous 110 kilograms.

Environmentally friendly products usuallyaren’t readily identifiable as such. Their true

value is found on the inside, and less is some-times more. Take the new Somatom Definitioncomputer tomograph, which contains 80 per-cent less lead than a comparable conventionalinstrument. Today, environmentally friendlyproducts are also more likely to be successfulthan other products, making them a sure betfor the future in more ways than one. So it’s nosurprise that product planning and manufac-turing trends are clearly moving in a greenerdirection — and that applies to everythingfrom industrial machinery to motors and cars,and from medical equipment and householdappliances to communication devices.

Siemens plans to achieve long-term profitablegrowth with environmentally friendly products.“To ensure that we effectively pursue this ob-jective, we’ve created a standard for the devel-opment of environmentally friendly productsthat is binding for all business areas andGroups,” reports Dr. Ferdinand Quella, who isresponsible for product-related environmentalprotection at Siemens. Siemens’ SN 36350guidelines cover all environmental factors, in-cluding energy efficiency, emission reductionto improve water and air purity, avoidance ofhazardous materials and resource conservationthrough the use of new materials and produc-tion processes. The guidelines take a holisticview of a product’s life cycle, considering every-thing from planning to disposal. This is consid-ered to be the best way to ensure maximumeconomic and environmental utility.

The standards in the guidelines apply toevery product developed by Siemens. And if a

The ECO-RTG system also illustrates justhow productive cooperation between differentGroups can be. Transportation Systems devel-oped the drive technology, for which Siemensholds several patents, and Industrial Solutionsand Services and A&D adapted the technologyfor the special requirements involved in itsapplication. The economic benefits are tremen-dous as well. Operating costs for the systemhave been reduced by an average of 50 per-cent. APM Terminals has already ordered morethan 50 ECO-RTG cranes for container terminalsin Spain, Morocco, China, and India.

Eighty Percent Less Lead. When SiemensMedical Solutions developed the SomatomDefinition computer tomograph, its engineersdemonstrated that customer requirements,environmental protection and economical op-erations go hand in hand. Here, developers also

planned to exceed the requirements in theSiemens 36350 standard while bringing an EcoExcellence product to market. This approachwas linked with challenging goals. For exam-ple, experts wanted to cut in half the radiationdose patients were exposed to, decreaseenergy consumption by one-third and reducelead content by over 80 percent. “These goalscould be achieved only by employing a newtechnological approach for the X-ray tubes,”says Johann Russinger, coordinator for Soma-tom Definition product-related environmentalprotection.

The big breakthrough was achieved by in-stalling two X-ray tubes at 90 degrees angles to

each other and using Siemens’ CARE Dose 4Dintelligent control system, which regulates theradiation dose in line with the area beingexamined. Two detectors simultaneously scanseveral lines, enabling a more targeted applica-tion of the X-ray beam. Capturing a high-qualityimage of a shoulder region containing a lot ofbone tissue, for example, requires a higher doseof radiation than that required for a picture ofthe lung region. By adjusting the radiation ac-cordingly, the overall dose can be reduced byup to 68 percent. This cuts energy and costswhile reducing radiation exposure.

Lead is usually used to protect against X-rays, and it also serves as a counterweight toexactly balance the large rotating masses of acomputer tomograph. Siemens engineers havenow succeeded in eliminating the need for thelead counterweight, while the lead required forX-ray protection has been reduced to a mini-mum — from 110 kilograms to just 19.

product proves to be particularly environmen-tally friendly, it can receive an Eco ExcellenceProduct award — after being subjected to athorough test procedure currently being devel-oped at Siemens. If the product in question isfound to significantly exceed the SN 36350guideline requirements and displays clear supe-riority over the best comparable products avail-able on the market, it will be honored with theEco Excellence distinction in recognition of itshigh level of sustainability.

Every three years, Siemens also presents itsinternal Environmental Award to employees andteams that develop particularly environmentallyfriendly products, solutions and processes. In2006, a panel consisting of Siemens experts andexternal scientists presented such awards forthe Somatom Definition computer tomograph,a diesel-electric hybrid drive for container cranesand energy-conserving subway trains. PowerGeneration also received an award for its com-mitment to environmentally sound products.

Materials are the Key. “Environmental pro-tection begins with designing environmentallysound products and manufacturing processes,”says Reinhard Kleinert, an expert at the Centerfor Materials & Microsystems at Siemens Cor-porate Technology in Berlin. “If you don’t makethe important decisions at the design stage, it’svery difficult to implement corrective measureslater — and even if you do, you’ll achieve an in-ferior result at greater effort and cost. That’swhy materials research is important for creat-ing environmentally friendly products.” Kleinertand his colleagues are currently working onplastics made from plants such as rape, instead

of petroleum. These materials can be disposedof by means of incineration without any prob-lem, because the incineration process only re-leases the amount of carbon dioxide (CO2) theplant absorbed while it was growing. Using thistype of plastic also preserves jobs in the agri-cultural sector. In Germany today, for example,renewable resources are cultivated on 13 per-cent of agricultural crop land.

According to internal estimates, Siemenscould utilize about 50,000 tons of plastics fromrenewable sources. Before the organic plasticscan be made ready for household appliances, en-gine housings, or communication systems, how-ever, the processes for manufacturing them needto be firmly established. To this end, Siemens isparticipating in BioFun, a research project that in-cludes BASF, and institutes such as the Fraunho-fer Institute for Reliability and Microintegration.

Fifty Percent Savings. One already successfulexample that fulfills the Eco Excellence criteriais the ECO-RTG diesel-electric hybrid drive sys-tem from Automation and Drives (A&D). Theseunits consume 50 percent less fuel in operationthan conventional systems, and save up to 70percent on fuel in standby mode. As a result,emissions have been cut in half and the sys-tems operate much more quietly. The drives areused in mobile container cranes, such as thoserecently tested at APM Terminals Internationalin Algeciras, Spain. According to product man-ager Alois Recktenwald, the drives’ key successfactor was the idea of “combining engine man-agement with energy regeneration. The energyreleased during braking and deceleration is stor-ed and utilized for subsequent acceleration.”

Siemens has been listed on the Dow JonesSustainability Index for seven years.

The ECO-RTG hybrid drive and the SomatomDefinition tomograph represent just two exam-ples of how systematically planned environmen-tal protection can lead to measurable successin a “win-win-win” situation — for people, theenvironment and business.

Siemens manufactures products that exceedthe requirements of environmental regulationsand set new, higher environmental standards.In recognition of this special commitment toeconomic, environmental and social sustain-ability, the company has been listed on the DowJones Sustainability Index for seven consecutiveyears since 2000.

� Harald Hassenmüller

Technology for the Environment | Water Treatment

SolutionsYou CanSwallowMicrobes, excessive amounts of nutrients and persistent organic pollutants in watercan damage our health and the environment. Siemens researchers are developinginnovative processes for removing or destroying these harmful substances.

Maryland, Pennsylvania, Virginia and Wash-ington D.C. are facing a huge challenge.

By 2010 they intend to reduce the amount ofnitrogen and phosphorus discharged intoChesapeake Bay by 50,000 tons per year. Thesenutrients pour into the bay from nearby cities,fields and sewage treatment plants, creatingextensive algal blooms, especially in the spring.When the algae die, bacteria consume not onlythe dead plankton, but also the oxygen in thewater, transforming large parts of the 300-kilo-meter-long estuary into dead zones.

In response, the three states and the Districtof Columbia have introduced strict limits fordischarges. Starting in 2010, one liter of treatedwastewater can contain an annual average ofonly three milligrams (mg) per liter of total ni-trogen and 0.3 mg per liter of total phosphorus.“That’s near the limit of what can be achievedusing biological processes to remove nitrogen,and even below the limit for phosphorus,” saysJames Scott of Siemens Water Technologies inSalt Lake City, who grew up on Chesapeake Bay.To meet this challenge, the 66 largest municipalsewage treatment plants in Maryland are beingmodernized — in many cases with Siemenstechnology. “These measures will enable Mary-land to achieve more than one-third of its re-duction-target obligation,” says Susan McCorveyof Water Technologies. Some older facilities willhave to be rebuilt, while more modern plantswill only need to be equipped with additionalfilters. “Proven technologies are used to removenutrients, but these technologies now have tobe refined,” explains Scott.

Nitrogen and phosphorus end up in sewagebecause they are present in food, cleansers andhuman excreta. Biological treatment at a waste-water facility involves using aerobic bacteria to


Pilot plant. Bacterial decomposition of molecules

convert them into inorganic nitrate and phos-phate. Phosphate can be precipitated using met-al salts or reduced to a level of about one mgper liter together with nitrate, by means of a bio-logical process. “Nitrate-reducing bacteria, whichlive under anaerobic conditions, can convert ni-trate into gaseous nitrogen,” says McCorvey.

Until 2003, the sewage treatment plant inFruitland, Maryland couldn’t even remove nu-trients from wastewater. But when its old filterwas replaced with an OMNIFLO SequencingBatch Reactor from Siemens everything chang-ed. In the reactor, wastewater sequentially un-dergoes purification stages in the same tank.Studies show that this enables the precise con-trol of the denitrification process using the du-ration of the aerobic and anaerobic stages. As aresult, the nitrogen content at the Fruitlandplant has been reduced by 80 percent, to threemg per liter. Similarly, the town of Aberdeen,Maryland, has installed an Astrasand filter.

Here, filtered wastewater flows through a mov-able bed of sand to remove suspended matter,and methanol is added to promote the growthof nitrate-reducing bacteria in the sand. Usinga sophisticated control mechanism that regu-lates the dwell time of the wastewater, the pu-rification cycles and the addition of methanolto feed the bacteria, Siemens engineers havesucceeded in eliminating up to 98 percent ofthe nitrate. “The Astrasand filter also can beused to precipitate phosphate,” says McCorvey.

Radicals at Work. Microbes, however, cannotbreak down all organic materials. Some sub-stances consume so much oxygen that aerobicbacteria suffocate. Now, Dr. Manfred Waidhasand his team from Corporate Technology (CT)in Erlangen have developed an electrochemicalprocess that breaks down previously non-biodegradable molecules so that they can besplit by bacteria into CO2 and water. Electrolysis

creates hydroxyl radicals in the water. Theseradicals are very reactive, consisting of onehydrogen atom and one oxygen atom.

The new process is being tested at a paperfactory, where, every day, a membrane filterremoves 600 cubic meters of concentrate con-taining lignin, which biodegrades very slowly.Until now, the concentrate has been precipi-tated using lime or an aluminum salt and thenincinerated. “But that just shifts the problemfrom water to land,” says Waidhas. “It’s muchbetter to destroy the pollutant.” His team is striv-ing to break down the lignin molecules so thatbacteria can consume them, using as little en-ergy as possible. “Our process is more efficientthan the alternative of adding ozone,” he says.

Just Add Salt. Electrochemical processes areideal for substances with high oxygen demand,metal compounds and dyes. However, somepollutants — including oils, pesticides, hor-mones and residues from pharmaceutical prod-ucts — resist such methods. These can be bro-ken down by a plasma process developed byengineers working under Dr. Werner Hartmannat CT in Erlangen (Pictures of the Future, Spring2005, p. 69). Here, water is exposed to high-voltage discharges, leading to the creation ofradicals that can break even very stable bonds.Hartmann believes this process is well-suitedfor industrial wastewater applications and lowconcentrations of very hazardous substances.

One advantage of such processes is that theyeliminate the need for chemicals. Still, chlorinegas will likely remain the standard for economi-cally disinfecting drinking water, although, ac-cording to Alberto Garibi of Siemens Water Tech-nologies in Miami, “Regulations are increasinglydeterring water management companies fromusing chlorine, due to safety concerns.” Sodiumhypochlorite solutions are often used as a sub-stitute because they eliminate the risk of a toxicgas release, and have the same effect as chlorine.“Sodium hypochlorite costs two to three timesas much as chlorine, however,” says Garibi. “Anddue to its high concentration, it must be storedand handled as a hazardous material. It also de-composes when stored for long periods.”

The new Osec B-Pak system from WaterTechnologies enables the production of hypo-chlorite on site. This compact system is practi-cally maintenance-free and comes with an intel-ligent control system for automatic operation.“All you need is salt,” says Garibi. Electrolysisconverts brine into sodium hypochlorite andhydrogen gas. To safely dispose of the hydrogen,it is diluted and ventilated to the atmosphere.“The hydrogen could be used in a fuel cell,” saysGaribi. “But recovering it isn’t yet economicallyfeasible.” � Ute KehseAstrasand filter. Low-nitrate water thanks to bacteria

New technology converts table salt into sodium

hypochlorite on site, where it can be used to

disinfect water for drinking, industrial use or

for swimming pools.


In Brief

� Several studies released in 2006 and

2007 confirmed that we face climate change

brought about by greenhouse gases such as

CO2, which are produced mainly through the

combustion of fossil fuels. To ensure the ef-

fects remain manageable, the earth’s tempera-

ture must not rise by more than two degrees

Celsius. The global energy supply therefore

has to be put on a new foundation that gener-

ates low amounts of carbon. (p. 80, 83, 84)

� All means have to be exploited to achieve

this goal. Energy consumers will need not only

more efficient solutions for heating systems,

household appliances and lighting, but also

energy-saving industrial motors and more

fuel-efficient transportation. Energy produc-

ers, meanwhile, will have to focus on boosting

the efficiency of their power plants and gener-

ating more energy from alternative sources

such as water, wind, biomass, geothermal

heat and waste. In each of these areas,

Siemens has developed solutions that are

already usable today. (p. 87, 90, 94, 98, 99)

� Siemens is also working on technologies for

the future, such as fossil-fuel power plants that

sequester CO2 and store it safely underground.

Other developments include fuel-cell hybrid

power plants that are designed to achieve an

electrical efficiency rating of 70 percent. This

is 10 percent more than the best combined

cycle plant currently under construction.

Siemens is also researching an extremely

efficient automotive drive system in which the

electric motors and brakes will be incorporated

into the wheels. (p. 91, 96, 99)

� Thanks to an in-house standard, Siemens

systematically takes environmental factors

such as energy efficiency and the prevention

of harmful substances into account when

planning new products. (p. 102)

� New solutions have also been developed for

water purification. They range from sophisti-

cated biological processes in which bacteria

destroy the pollutants and chemicals are not

required to plasma techniques which can

eliminate substances that were previously

non-biodegradable. (p. 104)

PEOPLE:

Business development & climate change:

Dr. Georg Rosenbauer, PG

[email protected]

Product-related environmental protection:

Dr. Ferdinand Quella, CT ES

[email protected]

Power plant technologies:

Alfons Benzinger, PG

[email protected]

Plasma treatment process:

Dr. Werner Hartmann, CT PS

[email protected]

Dr. Thomas Hammer, CT PS

[email protected]

Berlin waste processing plant:

Jürgen Knöfel, RD

[email protected]

SIPAPER Reject Power:

Dr. Hermann Schwarz, I&S

[email protected]

Fuel cells:

Horst Greiner, CT PS

[email protected]

Dr. Joachim Hoffmann, PG

[email protected]

Automotive technologies:

Enno Pflug, SV,

[email protected]

Oslo subway:

Walter Struckl, TS

[email protected]

Low-emissions ships:

Kay Tigges, I&S, [email protected]

Sewage plants in Maryland:

Susan McCorvey, I&S WT

[email protected]

Osec-B-Pak:

Alberto Garibi, I&S WT

[email protected]

Climate impact research:

[email protected]

LINKS:

Sustainability at Siemens:

www.siemens.com/sustainability

Power Generation:

www.siemens.com/power

Institute for Climate Impact Research:

www.pik-potsdam.de

| Preview Fall 2007

PreviewWould you like to know moreabout Siemens and our latestdevelopments?


Pictures of the Future | Feedback

The Future of the FactoryIn the future, production will be completely digitized — from the product design stage to manufacturing and logistics. This willopen up new perspectives for collaboration between developers,designers, producers and customers. As a result, production willbecome more flexible and made-to-measure products will comedirectly from the factory. Software and communications will playa key role in the digital factory of the future.

Seamless CommunicationsFixed-line networks, cellular radio and the Internet are merging to form the network of networks. Here, the goal is to provide uswith seamless communication — permanent access to the information we need, regardless of where we are, be it at home,in our cars, offices or factories. Everywhere — from production toenergy supply networks and the health care sector — informationand communications will enable us to further boost efficiency.But what technologies will we need to achieve our aims? How fast and reliable will our networks have to be? And how powerfulmust our software become?

Materials for the EnvironmentThe key to conserving resources, saving energy and reducing

greenhouse gases is often found in improved materials. For example, by using special ceramics that can withstand higher

combustion temperatures, we can improve the efficiency of power plants. New materials will not only be able to store

energy more efficiently but also transfer it with fewer losses —while analytical procedures will help to optimize materials

on the nanometer scale.

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Brochure on the Pictures of the Future method and the results ofthis strategic visioning and future planning method at SiemensMegacities study:Megacity Challenges — A Stakeholder Perspective

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Publisher: Siemens AGCorporate Communications (CC) and Corporate Technology (CT)Wittelsbacherplatz 2, 80333 Munich, GermanyFor the publisher: Dr. Ulrich Eberl (CC), Prof. Dr. Dietmar Theis (CT)[email protected] (Tel. +49 89 636 33246)

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Additional Authors in this Issue:Martin Arnold, Bernhard Bartsch, Dr. Dagmar Braun, Florian Martini, Ha-rald Hassenmüller, Dr. Karsten Hiltawsky, Andrea Hoferichter, Ute Kehse,Andreas Kleinschmidt, Michael Lang, Katrin Nikolaus, Bernd Müller, GittaRohling, Dr. Jeanne Rubner, Tim Schröder, Rolf Sterbak, Dr. Sylvia Trage,Dr. Evdoxia Tsakiridou, Thomas Veser, Harald Weiss, Nikola Wohllaib

Picture Editing: Judith Egelhof, Irene Kern, Jürgen Winzeck, Publicis MunichPhotography: Sam Ashfield, Kurt Bauer, Christian Höhn, BerndMüller, Karsten Schöne, Volker Steger, Jürgen WinzeckInternet (www.siemens.com/pof): Volkmar DimpflHistorical Information: Dr. Frank Wittendorfer, Siemens Corporate ArchivesAddress Database: Susan Süß, Publicis ErlangenLayout / Lithography: Rigo Ratschke, Büro Seufferle, StuttgartIllustrations: Natascha Römer, StuttgartGraphics: Jochen Haller, Büro Seufferle, StuttgartTranslation German — English: Transform GmbH, CologneTranslation English — German: Karin Hofmann, Publicis MunichPrinting: Bechtle Druck&Service, Esslingen

For further information: www.siemens.com/pof

Picture Credits: Osram (1 l.t., 34, 35 m.l., 38 t.l., b.), U-Systems (7t.l./r.), laif/Rieger (12 l.), private (13 t.l./r., 47 m.r.), laif/Falke (22t.r.), laif/Heeb (23 t.r.), BBC TV, London (31 m.), Luis Poulsen (35b., 108), Industrial Micro Systems AG (35 m.r.); Opel (38 t.m., 88box b.), Getty images/Doyle (50 t.), Corbis/Benser/Veer (51 t.m.),Corbis/Pixland (51 t.r.), Bayer AG (51 m.), Dr. Mukesh Harisinghani,Massachusetts General Hospital (52 t.), M. Taupitz, E. Schellen-berger Charité Berlin (54), Corbis/Freemann (56 m., b.), Dr. DavidTownsend, University of Tennessee (58), Jamey P. Weichert, Uni-versity of Wisconsin, Madison (59 t.l./m.), Brookhaven NationalLaboratory (59 t.r.), UCLA, J. Barrio (60 t.), Drs. Townsend, Nah-mias, University of Tennessee and Drs. Schlemmer, Pichler, Claussen,University of Tübingen (60 b.), Universitätsklinikum Essen (62),MagForce Nanotechnologies (63 t.), CEA ( 65 t., 66 t.l.), Vasconi(65 b.), Prof. Dr. Dr. Otmar Schober, University of Münster (66 t.r.),Uniklinik Freiburg (67 r.), Charité Berlin (68), Ostkreuz/Lehmann(69), Inmagine/Corbis (70), Lab Prof. Ralph Weissleder, MGHBoston (71), Voith Siemens Hydro (76-77), Corbis/Lanting (80),laif/Hilger (81 m.), Corbis/Strand (81 r.), Urban (84), ALBA (95 t.)Copyright of all other images is held by Siemens AG.

Pictures of the Future, syngo, ADVIA, IMMULITE and other names are re-gistered trademarks of Siemens AG. Other product names mentioned inthis magazine may be registered trademarks of their respective companies.

The editorial content of the reports does not necessarily reflect the opin-ion of the publisher. This magazine contains forward-looking statements,the accuracy of which Siemens is not able to guarantee in any way.

Pictures of the Future appears twice a year.Printed in Germany. Reproduction of the articles in whole or in partrequires the permission of the editorial office. This also applies to storagein electronic databases, on the Internet and reproduction on CD-ROM.

© 2007 by Siemens AG. All rights reserved. Siemens Aktiengesellschaft

Order number: A19100-F-P112-X-7600

ISSN 1618-5498

www.siemens.com/pof

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