News
3 August 2022
Applications are now open for the 1st EMME-CARE Autumn School on “Analysis of aerosols, air pollution and their sources in the Eastern Mediterranean” which will take place 31 October - 11 November 2022 in Nicosia, Cyprus. The Autumn School welcomes applications from M.Sc. and Ph.D. students in atmospheric and Earth system sciences. Successful applicants will have the opportunity to work on the analysis of aerosol, greenhouse gas and air pollution data based on the long-term d...
20 July 2022
From 30 May to 1 June, the Biological and Environmental Sciences students of the University of Pavia contributed to the data collection on coralline alga Ellisolandia elongata in Palmaria Island (Regional Park of Porto Venere, LTER Eastern Ligurian Sea Site).After a two years pandemic pause, the students had the opportunity to discover Palmaria Island, its marine and terrestrial ecosystems and the geology, under the guidance of ENEA researchers. In particular, the students contributed to the ann...
20 July 2022
BorealScat-2 is the new radar tower experiment located at Svartberget Experimental Forest for studying temporal variations in forest radar measurements. The tower, previously used in the BorealScat experiment, has been relocated and upgraded.The aim is to investigate forest moisture variations in P-/L-/C-/X-band tower-based radar observations and to develop methods for estimating forest evapotranspiration from space-borne radar observations. The antenna array at 50 m provides full 3D tomographic...
20 July 2022
In the Austrian Eisenwurzen, cultivation of local fruit tree varieties in traditional meadow orchards was an historically important type of land use. While today, this practice is still part of the region’s cultural identity and an important tourism asset, meadow orchards and their many ecological benefits disappeared from most European cultural landscapes during industrialization. In the course of combating climate change and biodiversity loss, however, there has been a renewed focus on agrofor...
19 July 2022
ESFRI (The European Strategy Forum for Research Infrastructures) was founded in 2002 for the purpose of further developing large-scale research facilities and research infrastructure networks in Europe in a strategy-driven and jointly coordinated process. ESFRI consists of delegates from the EU Member States and states associated with the EU Framework Programme for Research and Technological Development along with a representative from the European Commission.The creation of the “ESFRI Roadmap”...
19 July 2022
The 30th session of ERCA is planned to take place in Grenoble and at the Observatoire de Haute Provence for 3 weeks from January 15th to February 2nd, 2023. ERCA is intended as a multidisciplinary course rooted in atmospheric and climate sciences, yet extending to the social aspects of global change and air quality, to hydrology and oceanography, and to environmental chemistry.The organisers "strongly believe that global change issues need international and pluridisciplinary teams to be adressed...
19 July 2022
As part of the AtmoTrace project, funded by Science Foundation Ireland, the Center for Research into Atmospheric Chemistry (University College Cork, Ireland) has currently three PhD positions available focusing on the development of cavity enhanced absorption instrumentation for several applications reaching from laboratory developments, via atmospheric chamber studies, to airborne field campaigns. More information on the corresponding positions and application details can be found here:ht...
18 July 2022
Is there life on Jupiter's moon Europa? An ocean suspected to be under miles of ice gives science hope. But how might it be reached and explored? In March, a six-person research group from the Robotics Innovation Center of the German Research Center of Artificial Intelligence (DFKI) spent two weeks at Abisko Scientific Research Station.Their goal was to test an autonomous underwater vehicle (AUV) beneath the ice of lake Torneträsk. The researchers are working on developing a robot that can indep...
18 July 2022
BioDT (Biodiversity Digital Twin for Advanced Modelling, Simulation andPrediction Capabilities) is a recently started HE project in which eLTER is closely involved.BioDT aims to enhance the predictive understanding of biodiversity dynamics by developing a Biodiversity Digital Twin (BioDT) providing advanced modelling, simulation and prediction capabilities. By exploiting existing technologies and data from relevant research infrastructures in new ways, BioDT will be able to accurately and quanti...
18 July 2022
The EGU General Assembly 2023 will be held on site at the Austria Center Vienna (ACV), Austria, with online components provided to enable virtual attendance, from 23 to 28 April 2023.You can take an active part in organizing the scientific programme of the conference, from now until 19 September 2022, by suggesting sessions with conveners and description in your preferred programme group. You have the possibility of proposing either physical oral/poster sessions with a hybrid component or hybrid...
10 June 2018
One of the objectives of the eLTER Horizon 2020 project is to evaluate the performance of LTSER platforms. Recently published research reflects part of this evaluation: six LTSER platforms were assessed through site visits, coupled with the reflections and insights of the platform managers.
A new paper in the journal Environmental Research Letters presents the result of an assessment of six Long-Term Socio-Ecological Research (LTSER) p...
14 April 2018
In light of the eLTER Research Infrastructure (RI) being accepted on the ESFRI roadmap, the organisers of a recent workshop are keen to share their workshop report. Their workshop, which was called ‘Little Data, Big Data, No Data? Data Management in the Era of Research Infrastructures,’ was one of the initial steps in Finland towards being able to contribute data to the eLTER RI.
The data workshop was an outcome of the collaboration between the Academy of Finland funded MULTICS project (PI He...
23 October 2017
Dr Michael Mirtl, Chair of eLTER and ILTER, is attending the event, along with representatives from related European environmental research infrastructures (RIs). On Monday 23rd, he spoke about European and global long-term ecosystem research (LTER) site networks during a side event coordinated by the ENVRIplus EU project.During his talk, Dr Mirtl explained the potential for in situ LTER sites and networks to contribute to earth observation and remote sensing, including to initiatives such as Eu...
13 May 2017
Earlier this year, 23 projects were approved for funding via eLTER H2020’s first call for Transnational Access project proposals. Many of these research trips have now taken place, and several of the researchers and site managers involved have written blog posts about their experiences. We’ve teamed up with the US-based SSALTER blogs (Short Stories About Long-Term Research), which provides a great platform for hosting the articles. So far we’ve received stories from:
Whim, a Scottish bog,...
11 November 2016
The International Long-Term Ecological Research network (ILTER) represents the global umbrella for the formal LTER-Europe Regional Group. ILTER has been formally accepted as a Participating Organisation of GEO, the global Group on Earth Observations, following an application by ILTER’s chair, Michael Mirtl. Barbara Ryan, Secretariat Director of GEO was so impressed by ILTER’s global network of sites and their documentation in DEIMS that she encouraged ILTER to apply for GEO participant status. F...
18 September 2016
The eLTER H2020 project’s Core Team (comprising the coordinator and Work Package leaders and their deputies), met in Rome recently to review progress with the project.
eLTER H2020 has been running for 18 months. Excellent progress has been made in many areas of the project, which is generally running to the planned schedule. A range of deliverables has already been produced and more are at an advanced stage of completion.
The team also took the opportunity to review tasks and...
7 September 2016
Changes in air pollution and weather patterns have had marked effects on the UK’s terrestrial environment over the past 20 years. This is the main conclusion drawn from assessments of data from several of the UK’s longest running environmental research sites that comprise the UK Environmental Change Network (or ECN), presented in a new Special Issue of the journal Ecological Indicators.
While UK air temperatures have risen significantly since the onset of industrialisation (in line with the e...
13 August 2016
In her blog post, Jen Holzer describes her eLTER H2020 TA research to explore local perspectives in the Braila Islands, Romania. She's also been enjoying the region's wildlife! Jen Holzer, a PhD student at the Technion Socio-Ecological Research Group in Haifa, Israel visited the Braila Islands LTSER platform in Romania recently. Her research trip was supported by the eLTER H2020 project's Transnational Access (TA) scheme. Jen has written abo...
9 June 2016
Rothamsted Research, a partner in the UK's LTER network, has published a short report that highlights key changes in climate, pollution and biodiversity during the first 20 years of monitoring at its North Wyke ECN site. Scientists carrying out long-term monitoring at the UK Environmental Change Network's North Wyke site, operated by Rothamsted Research, have presented trends in the site's biodiversity and environment in a new publication. The period...
8 June 2016
A special issue concerning long-term ecosystem research has recently been published
The special issue of Ecological Indicators is dedicated to the 10th anniversary of the German network, LTER-D.
In their introductory paper, the editors, Peter Haase, Mark Frenzel, Stefan Klotz, Martin Musche and Stefan Stoll, describe two main reasons which long-term ecosystem research (LTER) is essential in order to understand environmental change. Fi...