World Solve

acid rain damaging forests remains one of the most urgent challenges of our time. Systems currently in place are inadequate for the scale and complexity of the problem. A successful approach must work where resources are scarcest and demonstrate clear, measurable results. It should identify possible harms, respect local agency, and show how the solution can be maintained and expanded by the communities it is meant to serve.

Warming, acidification, migration, and food-web changes may make historical fishing quotas unreliable. Management systems must adapt quickly while protecting food security and the livelihoods of small-scale fishers. The solution must work with limited capital, intermittent services, and local maintenance capacity. The research opportunity is to define measurable success criteria, test the approach in realistic settings, identify failure modes, and create a pathway from prototype to accountable deployment.

Penguin, krill, and seabird populations are already shifting or declining as habitats change and food webs reorganise. Long-term ecological monitoring and ecosystem-modelling platforms are needed to guide conservation.

Higher CO2 reduces carbonate availability. Global emission cuts are the primary solution.

Surface landers face pressures of 90 atmospheres and temperatures near 460°C, melting silicon microelectronics. High-temperature silicon carbide electronics and mechanical computing landers are required.

Decades of aquaculture expansion destroyed vast mangrove ecosystems. Current restoration efforts suffer from low sapling survival rates and conflicts with commercial shrimp farming interests.

Workers use bare hands and open nitric acid to extract gold and copper from electronics, inhaling deadly fumes and contaminating urban drainage networks.

Commercial seaweed farming faces high initial equipment costs and fragile processing supply chains, delaying its potential for carbon sequestration.

A subset of patients with chronic acid reflux don't find adequate relief through standard medication, leaving surgery as one of the few remaining options. A more effective non-surgical treatment remains needed.

Repeated gout attacks can cause lasting joint damage even with treatment, and prevention still relies mainly on managing uric acid levels rather than fully eliminating the underlying risk. A more definitive prevention method remains unmet.

As oceans absorb more carbon dioxide from the atmosphere, they become more acidic in ways that threaten shellfish, coral, and the broader marine food chain. Reversing or even halting this chemical shift remains beyond current technology.

Map and mitigate heavy metals, flame retardants, acids, and other pollutants leaching from informal electronics-processing sites into drinking-water aquifers.

Current approaches to restoration techniques for coral reefs that succeed under ongoing ocean warming and acidification either underperform under variable field conditions or generate externalities that undermine long-term sustainability and equity. Closing the gap requires coordinated advances in science, systems design and enabling institutions.