Integrated European
Long-Term Ecosystem, critical zone and
socio-ecological Research

News

2 August 2023
Empa is the research institute for materials science and technology of the ETH Domain and conducts cutting-edge research for the benefit of industry and the well-being of society. Its Laboratory for Air Pollution and Environmental Technology develops atmospheric measurement techniques and modelling tools as a contribution to a healthy and safe environment.Currently, Empa offers two open positions for:Analytical chemist, environmental scientist (read more here)Post-d...
2 August 2023
Since 2019 eLTER Switzerland has been listed in the Swiss Roadmap for Research Infrastructures. The new edition of the Swiss Roadmap for Research Infrastructures 2023 has confirmed that eLTER Switzerland is a key research infrastructure, which is under consideration for ERIC membership.The 2023 Swiss Roadmap for Research Infrastructures provides an overview of planned construction and existing research infrastructures. It also includes information on Swiss participation in international research...
1 August 2023
The Environment Agency Austria (ЕАА) organised this year's joint Task Force Meeting for ICP Integrated Monitoring and ICP Waters of the Geneva Convention on Long-range Transboundary Air Pollution (CLRTAP). The event took place at the WasserCluster Lunz in Austria and gathered a total of 60 experts from 17 countries. During the event, EAA also presented the results of 30 years of ecosystem monitoring at the Zöbelboden site, which is part of LTER Austria and a candidate for the...
1 August 2023
The Centre for Energy and Environment at Institut Mines-Télécom (IMT), France is looking for an engineer in atmospheric science measurement techniques. The position is vacant within the research unit working on Atmospheric Science, and more precisely within the ACTRIS-EU topical centre for reactive trace gases in-situ measurements (CiGas). The core responsibilities of the engineer are to contribute to the operation of CiGas and the associated projects by:Organising the technical activities...
31 July 2023
The advanced course "Use of Technology in Field Biology '' took place between 6-9 June 2023 at Herdade da Ribeira Abaixo (HRA), one of the sites included in the Portuguese LTsER Montado platform. This course focused on the use of technological tools, which are increasingly employed in the collection of animal ecology field data, mainly due to the development of equipment that allows for automatic recording and storage of environmental information. The students received training on the use o...
31 July 2023
Berchtesgaden National Park (BNP) has been established in 1978 and protects 208 km² of rugged mountain landscapes in the Bavarian Alps. Research and monitoring in the park are conducted in close collaboration with the Ecosystem Dynamics and Forest Management Group of the Technical University of Munich (TUM). The ecology of mountain ecosystems is a particular focus of its interdisciplinary research. BNP is searching for a fully funded, part-time 3-year PhD student (m/f/d) starting...
28 July 2023
To support biodiversity research, Biodiversa+ will launch a new transnational joint research call "Nature-based solutions for biodiversity, human well-being and transformative change - BiodivNBS" in September 2023. The call will provide a better understanding of the tipping points, trade-offs and underlying mechanisms that influence nature-based solutions and their successful implementation in terms of benefits for nature, human well-being and societal transformation.It will address three resear...
27 July 2023
This work is part of eLTER PLUS T9.3 and uses multiple eLTER sites to evaluate already available data from remote sensing and re-analyses. Specifically, eddy covariance data on evapotranspiration and gross primary production is used to validate the spatial data products. Relating the gross primary production to the evapotranspiration, the water-use efficiency of an ecosystem then indicates the water-use strategy of the vegetation and the variability of its functionality. We calcul...
26 July 2023
LTER-D is organising a session "Long-term and historical data: prerequisites to reveal changes in ecosystems in the light of global change" at the GFOE conference "The Future of Biodiversity – overcoming barriers of taxa, realms and scales" in Leipzig (12-16 September 2023)  with more than 1000 participants.The session is addressing the need to continuously track the status of ecosystems in order to watch the development and related impact on functions and processes in the long run. The imp...
25 July 2023
Representing the eLTER RI socio-ecological team, Daniel Orenstein and Merav Cohen from the Israel Institute of Technology traveled to Taiwan in April/May to learn about the Taiwanese experience in establishing LTSER platforms*.Taiwan’s three platforms (with a fourth in development) were established under the leadership of Prof. Teng-Chiu Lin and with the support of Taiwan’s National Science and Technology Council (NSTC). The platforms span diverse socio-ecological systems, including an island su...
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...
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...
17 July 2022
The ILTER scientific conference will take place this year in Novi Sad, Serbia, 12-14 October, 2022. The conference will be open to all interested parties. It will be held side-by-side with the annual ILTER Coordinating Committee meeting. CC members will receive a separate message regarding that meeting.Each presenting author will be required to register for the conference. The Website address for registration will be distributed in due time. The registration fee (stated in Euros, including local...
15 July 2022
SITES (Swedish Infrastructure for Ecosystem Science) is a national infrastructure for terrestrial and limnological field research that partners with eLTER.SITES aims to promote high-quality research through long-term field measurements and field experiments, and by making data and station access available to researchers, regardless of institution. The core of SITES is nine field research stations that represent a variety of Swedish climate zones and ecosystems, including agricultural land, fores...
14 July 2022
The SOILSERV ANR project conducted from 2017-2021 combined biophysical and socio-economic approaches to assess at different spatial scales ecosystem services of agricultural soils within mixed agroecosystems involving crops, livestock and uncultivated areas and to analyse their economic valuation in farmers’ choices or their consideration in territory planning. To address the various scales, the project relied on three main study sites selected as they offer sound existing preliminary infor...
12 July 2022
Dr Jan Dick is a social ecologist at the UK Centre for Ecology & Hydrology (UKCEH), a member of the LTER-UK’s Environmental Change Network (ECN) team and an active contributor to eLTER. Jan gave a talk recently, during which she described UKCEH's interest in using passive acoustic monitoring techniques. She was speaking at the UK Acoustic Network's symposium in Manchester (15-16 June 2022).Jan presented work by eLTER that aims to define a set of standard observations and associated methods,...
10 July 2022
The first BioDT webinar presents the project's objectives and goals, and its interaction with the LUMI Supercomputer, fundamental for building its modelling and simulation capabilities. The discussion will pave the way for the four BioDT use case groups and how their development can help scientists in predicting future trends in the biodiversity field. The event gives also the opportunity to meet the people behind the project and to interact with them during a poll session and a panel...
10 July 2022
A seminar on acacia trees and water in the southern Arava was held on 31.3.2022, at the Eilot Branch of the Dead Sea and Arava Science Center (DSASC). The seminar was part of an environmental educational project "Water in the Desert", with the support of KKL, Eilot Regional Council and the DSASC.The seminar was attended by about 50 participants, including KKL representatives, scientists, various stakeholders and local audience. During the seminar, we enjoyed fascinating lectures about acacias gi...
7 July 2022
On 15 May, a team from the UK Centre for Ecology & Hydrology jointly hosted an event (with Dundee University) in Kincraig as part of the Cairngorms Nature Big Weekend. The event aimed to show people some of the scientific research that takes place in the Cairngorms National Park. Aimed at all age groups, it was an opportunity for people to contribute their own ideas about the research needed in the park.Environmental Change Network monitoring at the Cairngorms ECN site was among the activiti...
14 April 2023
We are excited to announce the launch of the eLTER Instagram account: europeanlter!To ensure that the eLTER community reaches out to as wide an audience as possible, we launched the eLTER Instagram account. As of January 2023, the majority of Instagram users (around 77%) are between the age of 18 - 44. eLTER puts a special focus on reaching early career researchers, one of the main target audiences of the project. Apparently, Instagram is the place to be.Being an entirely visual platform, Instag...
13 April 2023
After months of preparation, eLTER launched its Grand Campaign (GC) aimed at filling a critical gap in the photo/video archive of the project and to significantly strengthen communication and dissemination activities. The RI's central communication team will visit selected sites and platforms in over 20 partner countries to take photos and videos with drone and camera, as well as to interview researchers and the national LTER teams.The Grand Campaign will provide five core outcomes (and a f...
13 February 2023
Ninety researchers from 26 countries, part of the eLTER PPP and eLTER PLUS projects, gathered in Mallorca from 16 to 20 May 2022 for the first ever consortia physical meeting. This was a great opportunity to capture the spirit of the projects, so a professional team was hired to shoot 23 videos which we present to you now. They are grouped into three categories: - eLTER Stakeholders Information: The videos here aim to provide comprehensive and tailored information to the four main Stakehold...
2 February 2023
The Karst Research Institute at the Research Centre of the Slovenian Academy of Sciences and Arts (ZRC SAZU) is the leading partner of the LTER Slovenia consortium which belongs to eLTER. Within the consortium, multidisciplinary research focuses on karst areas, regions characterized by water-soluble rocks, which results in the absence of water at the surface, as water flows mainly underground through fractures.On the surface, the most characteristic karst landforms are karst plateaus and various...
30 January 2023
HORIZON-MISS-2022-SOIL-01Lead by: Tristano Bacchetti-De-Gregoris, SAE SpainBudget: ~€3MLifespan: 2023 – 2026The main goal of the CREDIBLE project is to build momentum and trust for the implementation of carbon farming in the EU. This will be primarily achieved by setting up and moderating a network of initiatives, projects and stakeholders for favouring transparency, environmental integrity, and methodology standardisation in soil carbon accounting.Such a Network of Networks will be responsible...
27 January 2023
During a three-day hybrid workshop shortly before Christmas 2022, eLTER met with NEON to discuss several topics and learn from NEON’s long-term experience in operating a large-scale observation facility. NEON is the US National Science Foundation's National Ecological Observatory Network, a continental-scale observation facility operated by Battelle and designed to collect long-term open access ecological data to better understand how the nation’s ecosystems are changing. NEON has been operation...
25 January 2023
New research on microplastics using eLTER data has been published. Microplastics (MPs), which are defined as all plastic particles smaller than 5 mm, can create health problems for all living organisms, including humans, due to their very small size. Recent research has shown that, unexpectedly, mountain snowpack can store high amounts of MPs, derived from both atmospheric deposition and local sources (e.g., tourism).During the 2020-2021 winter, the team investigated the MP content of snow at th...
24 January 2023
EuroGEO is Europe’s part of the Group on Earth Observations (GEO) - a worldwide network working to build a Global Earth Observation System of Systems (GEOSS). The aim is to provide a coherent picture of environmental and Earth observation in Europe by combining existing Earth observation assets and initiatives. Fundamental to this is the provision of in-situ data for calibration and validation purposes which was emphasized several times during a recent EuroGEO workshop.eLTER was represented at t...
23 January 2023
Between 29 November and 1 December, eLTER held its first hybrid Scientific Advisory Board (SAB) and Steering Committees (SC) meeting in Berlin. 25 members of the SC and 5 members of the SAB met physically at the Berlin Office of the Helmholtz Association joined by 60online participants from research performing organisations during a dedicated half day info session.Michel Mirtl, co-coordinator of eLTER, opened the meeting with the followinginspiring words:“This meeting marks a milestone in severa...
19 January 2023
On 17-18 January the eLTER coordination, National Coordinators and site managers from Belgium, the Netherlands, Ireland and the UK gathered in Brussels to discuss current developments in their national networks.The meeting proved to be a great opportunity to identify common challenges and exchange experiences with pushing forward national processes towards establishing eLTER. Moreover, the participants were thoroughly updated on the current status of eLTER from a European perspective.“It was a u...
19 April 2023
The call “EURIZON FELLOWSHIP PROGRAMME: Remote Research Grants for Ukrainian Researchers” is officially open under the H2020 Eurizon Project.The 6/12 months grant will provide temporary support to vulnerable researchers in Ukraine and, if possible, initiate structured and long-term EU-UA scientific and technical collaborations and joint publications (funding is only for UA researchers).Deadline for applications: May 8th, 2023 at 12:00 (noon) CESTAll details and the application form are available...
13 April 2023
Established in September 2013, Wetlands International Europe is the single network organisation in Europe bringing together 10 NGOs whose shared mission is to inspire and mobilise society to safeguard and restore wetlands for people and nature. Our ambition for the period 2020-2030 is to upscale action to safeguard and restore wetlands, collaborating with multiple partners and mobilising a wide range of actors to transform whole landscapes and sectors. Our access to cutting-edge science, combine...
12 April 2023
The University of Bern is the third largest university in Switzerland. The position offers a world-class environment with an outstanding infrastructure.Carbonaceous particulate matter comprises a large fraction of the atmospheric aerosol and, therefore, badly affects our climate and human health. Measures that aim at improving air quality require that emission sources are apportioned and quantified individually. However, this endeavor has succeeded only for a small fraction of the carbonaceous p...
20 February 2023
The KIT Institute of Meteorology and Climate Research (IMK-AAF) offers three jobs for expanding and strengthening the team responsible for designing and building the new atmospheric simulation chamber AIDAc2 and the service chamber AIDAs. Both activities are funded by the Federal Ministry of Education and Research through the ACTRIS-D projects targeting the implementation of the KIT National Facilities and the Topical Center f...
19 February 2023
The Department of Environmental Science (ACES) at Stockholm University is one of the largest departments in the Faculty of Science. The department is divided into four units with more than 190 researchers, teachers, doctoral students and technical/administrative staff from over 30 countries. The department has a strong focus on research, spanning from couplings between climate change and biogeochemical cycles (atmosphere-land-ocean) to the sources, transport and effects of environmental contamin...
13 February 2023
Berchtesgaden National Park is Germany's only national park in the Alps. It offers unique opportunities for research on mountain landscapes and their natural dynamics. Particularly relevant research topics include species conservation, ecosystem dynamics, long-term ecological monitoring across trophic levels, and learning from protected areas for ecosystem management. Research and monitoring in Berchtesgaden National Park is led by Prof. Rupert Seidl, Chair of Ecosystem Dynamics and Forest Manag...
6 February 2023
Atmospheric pollution is associated with demonstrated health and climate issues. Our understanding of the sources and transformation processes are confronted with the chemical complexity of the particulate phase, and more particularly of its organic fraction. The metrological limits of the instruments commonly used in the various observatories therefore deprive us of a complete vision of the mechanisms involved.Indeed, it has been recently underlined that in Paris, for instance, around 80% of or...
6 February 2023
The ESA EarthCARE Team is looking for a young graduate trainee to undertake an investigation into the EarthCARE mission. EarthCARE’s objective is to investigate the interaction between clouds, aerosols and radiation, providing global profiles of clouds, aerosols and precipitation along with co-located radiative flux measurements. The data will be used to evaluate the representation of these constituents in weather forecasting and climate models. The payload consists of the ATmospheric LIDar...
1 February 2023
The Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT), Germany, is looking for a PostDoc (2 years) or PhD student (3 years) in ground-based remote sensing of low-level clouds and fog in the context of the European Aerosol, Clouds and Trace Gases Research Infrastructure (ACTRIS) project. The successful candidate will work with state-of-the-art ground-based remote sensing instrumentation and collaborate locally and in the wider ACTRIS network. Learn more and apply here.
27 January 2023
iDiv, together with the Martin Luther University Halle-Wittenberg, announces three full-time employment positions to work with the new European Topic Center on Biodiversity and Ecosystems on the regulatory monitoring of the EU Nature Directives and knowledge and technical support for the Nature Restoration Law.The European Topic Centre Biodiversity and Ecosystems (ETC-BE) is a Consortium of 24 European organisations with expertise in the topic area of terrestrial, freshwater and marine biodivers...