CODEPASS

Community complexity and the decomposition process in aquatic systems

- an ecosystem approach to manage biodiversity -

co-ordinator : L.ROSSI

This research project develops an ecosystem level approach to biodiversity conservation in inland aquatic ecosystems. We will study the relationships between community organization and stability,ecosystem processes and biodiversity (i.e., their covariation or the trade-off occurring among them) at undisturbed and disturbed sites of "n" (more than 10) water bodies in five significant areas of Western Europe. In the present research proposal, biodiversity, community assembly rules, food web patterns, detritus processing and nutrient cycling represent the "target features" of field and laboratory experiments. This project will integrate a process-oriented with a population-community approach and an holistic approach, looking for large scale patterns of variation and covariation of the target features, with a reductionistic approach, looking for the assessment of the functional, mechanistic, links among the target features.

The project is designed to reach the following main objectives:

• To describe the relationships among rates and efficiencies of plant detritus decay, nutrient dynamics and biodiversity of decomposers under undisturbed and disturbed conditions;
• To assess the role of biodiversity on the three trophic food web patterns, on the population degree of food generalization and on the detritus processing, in inland aquatic ecosystems with different inputs and typologies;
• To analyze the role of constraints and interactions occurring at population level on each of the target features and on their inter-relationships;

The main goals are:

• To integrate knowledgments on detritus processing and nutrient cycling, food web organization and biodiversity into the ecosystem framework;
• To relate the functioning of detritus processing with the constraints which affects the energetic and coexistence of the decomposers;
• To establish a scientific basic procedure to integrate biodiversity and habitat management in inland aquatic ecosystem.

Exchange of scientists among the partners will allow the application of the same experimental design and of the same methodology to the different study habitats, the achievement of the same taxonomic resolution and the improvement of the respective performances.

contact :

CONISMA.GBM,
Dipartimento di Genetica e Biologia Molecolare,
Università di Roma "La Sapienza",
Italy
rossilre@axrma.uniroma1.it

web site :