Biodiversity

Biodiversity and thus the state of river ecosystems can now be predicted. To achieve this, researchers from the University of Zurich and Eawag (Aquatic Science and Technology) are combining environmental DNA with hydrological methods. Using the river Thur as an example, the approach allows identifying target areas for conservation and initiating protective measures.

The worldwide loss of species is sufficiently documented. However, local biodiversity trends in Europe sometimes differ considerably from global patterns, an international research team with the participation of the Swiss Federal Research Institute for Forest, Landscape and Landscape Research WSL points out. In particular, the composition of species communities has changed considerably locally. The study, which appears today in the scientific journal "Nature Communications", has implications for the development of effective conservation strategies.

Natural environments vary in space and time and are now drastically changing due to human activities. Environmental changes, like increasing acidity in a pond, can strongly affect the long-term prospects of species. Katja Räsänen from Eawag’s department Aquatic Ecology aims to understand how natural populations of the moor frog adapt to environmental change.

Since spring 2018, the newly developed underwater camera Aquascope has been recording a wide variety of plankton species in Lake Greifen. These sensitive organisms can thus, for the first time, be observed undisturbed in their natural habitat – an important step towards automated monitoring of water quality and aquatic biodiversity.

If one observes the competition between parasites and symbionts, much can be learned about the theory of evolution. Two Eawag researchers have thus shown in a new study that high parasite diversity promotes symbiont diversity.