The project aims at achieving a better understanding of the processes that drive or limit the response of grassland systems in a world of increasing atmospheric pCO2. We will test the hypothesis that the previously shown increase in below-ground allocation of C under elevated pCO2 provides the necessary energy excess and will stimulate free-living N2 fixers in a low N grassland environment. The project thus aims at assessing the occurrence and importance of free-living N2 fixers under elevated pCO2 and identify the associated microbial communities involved in order to better understand ecosystems response and sustainability of grassland systems. This project had the last opportunity to obtain soil samples from a grassland ecosystem adapted to long-term (10 year) elevated atmospheric pCO2 as the Swiss FACE experiment. The project aims to identify the relevant components of free-living diazotrophs of the microbial community using 15N stable isotope - DNA probing.
Earthquake and landslide risk is a public safety issue that requires appropriate mitigation measures and means to protect citizens, property, infrastructure and the built cultural heritage. Mitigating this risk requires integrated and coordinated action that embraces a wide range of organisations and disciplines. For this reason, the LESSLOSS IP is formulated by a large number of European Centres of excellence in earthquake and geotechnical engineering integrating in the traditional fields of engineers and earth scientists some expertise of social scientists, economists, urban planners and information technologists. The LESSLOSS project addresses natural disasters, risk and impact assessment, natural hazard monitoring, mapping and management strategies, improved disaster preparedness and mitigation, development of advanced methods for risk assessment, methods of appraising environmental quality and relevant pre-normative research. In order for the multi-disciplinary S&T ingredients of the project to be tackled in an efficient and productive manner, the research programme has been split into three distinct areas: physical environment, urban areas and infrastructures. For each one of this areas four main types of transversal fields have been identified as fundamental and capable of producing permanent effects on risk mitigation: (i) instrumentation and monitoring, (ii) methods and technologies to reduce vulnerability, (iii) innovative approaches for design/assessment and (iv) disaster scenarios and loss modelling. Within this general framework, specific objectives will be pursued, such as the development of innovative methods and approaches to design and assessment of structures and earth slopes for both short- and long-term implementation, the development of advanced monitoring techniques and devices, and the development, manufacturing and testing of innovative isolating and dissipating seismic devices. Prime Contractor: Universita degli Studi di Pavia; Pavia; Italy.
Under the 2003 EU Greek presidency, cooperation with Balkan countries on environmental issues was identified as a priority of the EU/Balkan Action Plan. Large-scale co-operation is essential for effective action in the vulnerable Mediterranean and Black Sea coastal zones. During the last 50 years both areas suffered major changes; as semi-enclosed basins, both Seas are ultra-sensitive to anthropogenic stress and to climate change. An EU Presidency Conference on Sustainable Development in the Mediterranean/Black Sea (May 2003), revealed major gaps in management structures, scientific strategies and identified a diversity of environmental issues to be resolved through priority-focused RTD cooperation. Yet, while pressure on the resources of the two seas increases and the potential impact of climate change on coastal and deep-sea resources remains unknown, the two seas have never been jointly studied as systems of interacting basins and ecosystems. The proposal outlines collaboration and clustering schemes involving environmental, economic and scientific organisations in Mediterranean, Black Sea and other EU nations, in order to create synergies in networking and exchanges at several levels, addressing for the first time the system of interconnected basins as one, based on the integration of, both horizontally and vertically, natural scientists and economists. These will: 1) Create an international, interdisciplinary platform coordinating the region's scientific potential in order to prepare RTD projects, based on a Science Plan for the region, securing sustainable development; 2) Focus on natural and anthropogenic pressures exerted upon the functioning of the ecosystem; 3) Reinforce RTD capacity by setting up an environment/resource monitoring network in the light of existing observation networks of different scopes. Prime Contractor: Hellenic Centre for Marine Research, Institute of Oceanography, Anavyssos, GR.
In contrast to their advances in other areas, weather forecast models have not been successful in improving the Quantitative Precipitation Forecast during the last 16 years. One reason for this stagnation is the lack of comprehensive, high-quality data sets usable for model validation as well as for data assimilation, thus leading to improved initial fields in numerical models. Theoretical analyses have identified the requirements measured data have to meet in order to close the gaps in process understanding. In field campaigns, it has been shown that the newest generation of remote sensing systems has the potential to yield data sets of the required quality. It is therefore time to combine the most powerful remote sensing instruments with proven ground-based and airborne measurement techniques in an Intensive Observations Period (IOP). Its goal is to serve as a backbone for the SPP 1167 by producing the demanded data sets of unachieved accuracy and resolution. This requires a sophisticated scientific preparation and a careful coordination between the efforts of the institutions involved. For the first time, the pre-convective environment, the formation of clouds and the onset and development of precipitation as well as its intensity will be observed in four dimensions simultaneously in a region of sufficient size. This shall be achieved by combining the IOP with international programs and by collaboration between leading scientists in Europe, US and other countries. Thus, the IOP is a unique opportunity to make Germany the setting of an international field campaign featuring the newest generation of measurement systems such as scanning radar and lidar and leading to outstanding advances in atmospheric sciences.
Recent events such as the Pakistan earthquake, Hurricane Katrina, the Indian Ocean tsunami and the European heat waves of 2003 reveal the vulnerability of societies to extreme events. The goal of this project is to strengthen prevention, mitigation and preparedness strategies in order to reduce the health, social and economic impacts of extreme events on communities. The objectives of the MICRODIS project are to strengthen the scientific and empirical foundation on the relationship between extreme events and their impacts; to develop and integrate knowledge, concepts, methods and databases towards a common global approach and to improve human resources and coping capacity in Asia and Europe through training and knowledge sharing. This integrated project involves 19 partners from Asia and Europe, including research, policy and ground roots institutions. The outputs will include an evidence-base on impacts, field methodologies and tools for data compilation, impact models, and integrated vulnerability assessments. It will also strengthen standardised data collection of extreme events and their impacts at local, regional and global levels. Prime Contractor: Université Catholique de Louvain; Louvain-la-neuve; Belgium.
Context: With increasing global change pressures, and due to existing limitations, and un-sustainability factors and risks of conventional urban water management (UWM), cities experience difficulties in efficiently managing the ever scarcer water resources, their uses/services, and their after-use disposal, without creating environmental, social and/or economic damage. In order to meet these challenges, SWITCH calls for a paradigm shift in UWM. There is a need to convert adhoc actions (problem/incident driven) into a coherent and consolidated approach (sustainability driven). This calls for an IP Approach. Research conceptSWITCH therefore proposes an action research project which has as a main objective: The development, application and demonstration of a range of tested scientific, technological and socio-economic solutions and approaches that contribute to the achievement of sustainable and effective UWM schemes in 'The City of the future'.The project will be implemented by different combinations of consortium partners, along the lines of seven complementary and interactive themes. The research approach is innovative for the combination of: action research: address problems through innovation based upon involvement of users.learning alliances: to link up stakeholders to interact productively and to create win-win solutions along the water chain; multiple-way learning: European cities learn from each other and from developing countries, and vice versa.multiple-level or integrated approach: to consider the urban water system and its components (city level) in relation to its impacts on, and dependency of, the natural environment in the river basin (river basin level), and in relation to Global Change pressures (global level).Instruments and scopeAn IP with 30 partners, their resources, and a total budget of 25,191,396 EURO including budget for demonstration activities in 9 Cities in Europe and developing countries. Prime Contractor: UNESCO - Institute for Water Education, Delf, Netherlands.
MAI-TAI deals with integrated water resources management. It is designed as a coordination action of leading research and innovation operators, aiming at developing a coherent set of innovative, relevant and cooperative policy options and management strategies. Regionally it works with partners from China and India, and the work will focus around two lead river basins: The Hai river basin in North-East China and the Yamuna river basin in North India, both in arid and/or semi arid regions. The proposal features the following core coordination activities: 1. Enabling a dialogue between researchers and practitioners promoting state of the art and indigenous technologies and practices: The consortium believes that modern systems alone are not capable of solving the water needs of the people in many developing countries, and there is a strong need of generating innovative options through cross fertilization between both worlds. This cross-fertilization will be enabled by methods and rich experiences of user innovations research. 2. Based on (1), innovative policy options and management strategies will be compiled. Then, a multi-stakeholder interaction in order to evaluate these options and strategies will be carried out, supported by intelligent knowledge management tools: In the presence of a variety of actors (institutions, organisations, individuals) each with specific forms of knowledge with respect to scale, topic, reasoning processes, and a large number of information expected to be generated through the multi-stakeholder interaction, the issue of learning and knowledge management is of paramount importance. A strong impact of the coordination action is ensured by a highly inter- and transdisciplinary team, encompassing internationally reputable scientific institutions as well as strong governmental partners and NGOs. The latter two will considerable facilitate a wide and in particular meaningful stakeholder dialogue throughout the project.
Coastal ecosystems are particularly vulnerable to anthropogenic perturbation, affecting biodiversity and ecosystem stability and resilience. Shallow water sediments and their associated biota represent a reservoir for biodiversity, hosting resting and reproductive stages of planktonic organisms, and regulating carbon and nutrient biogeochemical cycles. However, the relationship between tightly coupled biological and geochemical processes in this environment is poorly defined with respect to their temporal and spatial variability. The overall objective of COBO is to integrate emerging and innovative technologies from different disciplines (physics, chemistry, biology, imagery) to provide in situ monitoring of sediment habitats, a key component of coastal marine ecosystems, in order to understand complex interactions between the biota (function and diversity) and their chemical environment. Existing technologies have limited spatial and temporal sampling resolutions and this has hampered progress in determining key parameters and in explaining biogeochemical patterns / processes and in modeling ecosystem dynamics. Improved in situ technologies are required to provide rigorous scientific information on processes regulating this unique and fragile habitat and for assessing, controlling and minimising human impact on European coastal waters thus addressing societal need. Organism-sediment processes, with both enhancing and mediating effects, are still poorly understood in shallow water sediments that receive the bulk of anthropogenic disturbance. The combination of innovative instruments from the different disciplines will provide powerful tools to significantly advance our understanding of organism sediment relations under dynamic coastal conditions and enhance predictive capability. COBO represents a major step towards the development of permanently operating benthic observatories for coastal management. Prime Contractor: Scottish Association for Marine Science; Dunberg Oban; United Kingdom.
The ARCHAIA project aims at implementing two training seminars on cultural heritage based on an innovative integrated perspective deriving both from the human and the natural sciences. The seminars address 90 post-graduate students, scholars and professionals of different backgrounds. Starting from the need of disseminating the results of 9 funded EU research projects and COST actions, we aim at presenting these within an innovative framework, i.e. a global approach towards planning and management of archaeological parks starting from the very first steps of field research and going through the characterisation of the materials retrieved and topographical studies in order to mould every bit of historical information within a coherent project, properly displayed for the public. Through an innovative didactic methodology, innovative scientific contents will be disseminated. Dealing with the initial program of archaeological research in the field, integrated with techniques of archeobiological and geoarchaeological investigation, our final goal is to supply the participants with the guidelines for moulding research strategies and managing archaeological sites, in order to be able to publicly display the historical content derived from research results and effectively proceed to the protection of the cultural heritage. One training seminar will be in Copenhagen and another one in Bologna. Five key topics have been selected: Topic 1 concerns Topography, surveying and landscape archaeology, Topic 2 Archaeological research and restoration of monuments, Topic 3 Material culture characterization, Topic 4 Anthropology and environment and Topic 5 Data processing and public presentation. The dissemination of the lectures presented through a monograph and multimedia products will also supply guidelines for integrated protocols on the management of archaeological sites, set in their landscape, within a global perspective.
The working documents on revision of the Sewage Sludge Directive (86/278/EEC) on Biowaste and the Soil Protection Communication call for standards on sampling and analysis of sludge, treated biowastes and soils. The European Directives are intended to prevent unacceptable release of contaminants, impairment of soil function, or exposure to pathogens, and to protect crops, human and animal health, the quality of water and the wider environment when sludges and treated biowastes are used on land. The EU animal by-product regulations are fixing microbiological threshold values, for which microbiological methods of analysis are needed. The European Commission wishes to cite European (CEN) standards in order that there is harmonised application of the directives and that reports from Member States (MS) can be compared. This project to develop standards for hygienic parameters in sludge, soil and biowaste, presented under the name 'HORIZONTAL-HYG', will be carried out under the umbrella of the main project HORIZONTAL 'Development of horizontal standards for soil, sludge and biowaste'. This ensures full integration in the CEN system through BT Task Force 151 specially set up in support of this project as well as direct supervision by DG ENV and MS, which form the Steering Committee of HORIZONTAL. Preparation of HORIZONTAL-HYG was taken in a full agreement with the DG ENV, DG JRC and the MS already contributing to HORIZONTAL. HORIZONTAL-HYG's objective is to produce standardised methods for sampling and hygienic microbiological parameters, as Salmonella spp, Escherichia coli, Clostridium perfringens, Ascaris ova in sludges, treated biowastes and soils written in CEN format. Validation of the methods is an essential part of the development as it quantifies performance in terms of repeatability and reproducibility. The consortium is well connected in CEN and ISO and thus provides an excellent basis for implementation of the deliverables. Prime Contractor: Energieonderzoek Centrum Nederland; Petten, Netherlands.
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