Mathias Labah normally catches fish in the Baltic Sea but today, the rope he is pulling out of the water a few kilometres off Germany’s north coast is not a net filled with herring or cod, but a plastic cylinder about 30 centimetres long. Labah carefully hoists the device onto the deck of the Solea research vessel, frees it from the water and reveals an innovative probe which could play a vital role in how the crisis-ridden coastal fishermen and women of northern Germany could earn more money and attract new recruits in the future. The device measures oxygen, temperature, salinity and pressure…