An investigation into the use of riverine mesocosms to analyse the effect of flow velocity and recipient textiles on forensic fibre persistence studies.

Textile fibre evidence can provide important activity level information in criminal cases. To date, very few studies have investigated fibre persistence on fabrics exposed to aquatic conditions, even though items of evidence and victim's bodies can regularly be found in aquatic environments. This lack of research on whether fibres (and other trace evidence) persist on evidence submerged in water, has shown to impact practice as it is reported that crime scene examiners do not attempt to recover this evidence, due to the belief that it would not be present.

Large-scale sampling of the freshwater microbiome suggests pollution-driven ecosystem changes.

Freshwater microbes play a crucial role in the global carbon cycle. Anthropogenic stressors that lead to changes in these microbial communities are likely to have profound consequences for freshwater ecosystems. Using field data from the coordinated sampling of 617 lakes, ponds, rivers, and streams by citizen scientists, we observed linkages between microbial community composition, light and chemical pollution, and greenhouse gas concentration.

High Anthropogenic Organic Matter Inputs during a Festival Increase River Heterotrophy and Refractory Carbon Load.

Streams and rivers metabolize dissolved organic matter (DOM). Although most DOM compounds originate from natural sources, recreational use of rivers increasingly introduces chemically distinct anthropogenic DOM. So far, the ecological impact of this DOM source is not well understood.

A simplified approach to detect a significant carbon dioxide reduction by phytoplankton in lakes and rivers on a regional and global scale.

Carbon dioxide (CO) uptake by phytoplankton can significantly reduce the partial pressure of CO (pCO) in lakes and rivers, and thereby CO emissions. Presently, it is not known in which inland waters on Earth a significant pCO reduction by phytoplankton is likely. Since detailed, comparable carbon budgets are currently not available for most inland waters, we modified a proxy to assess the pCO reduction by phytoplankton, originally developed for boreal lakes, for application on a global scale.

Collaborative Projects: Unleashing Early Career Scientists' Power.

Collaborative research projects exclusively targeted to early career researchers (ECRs) have been initiated in Europe. So far, the first two collaborative projects have united more than 80 ECRs. We describe the structure and benefits of such initiatives for the ECRs and highlight the positive influence on the whole scientific community.

Phytoplankton gross primary production increases along cascading impoundments in a temperate, low-discharge river: Insights from high frequency water quality monitoring.

Damming alters carbon processing along river continua. Estimating carbon transport along rivers intersected by multiple dams requires an understanding of the effects of cascading impoundments on the riverine metabolism. We analyzed patterns of riverine metabolism and phytoplankton biomass (chlorophyll a; Chla) along a 74.

Cleaning and sampling protocol for analysis of mercury and dissolved organic matter in freshwater systems.

Mercury (Hg), and in particular its methylated form (methylmercury, MeHg), is a hazardous substance with the potential to produce significant adverse neurological and other health effects. Enhanced anthropogenic emissions and long-range transport of atmospheric Hg have increased Hg concentrations above background levels in aquatic systems. In this context, the Minamata Convention, a global legally binding agreement that seeks to prevent human exposure to Hg, was signed and enforced by 128 countries, and today more than 90 Parties have ratified it.

The interplay between total mercury, methylmercury and dissolved organic matter in fluvial systems: A latitudinal study across Europe.

Large-scale studies are needed to identify the drivers of total mercury (THg) and monomethyl-mercury (MeHg) concentrations in aquatic ecosystems. Studies attempting to link dissolved organic matter (DOM) to levels of THg or MeHg are few and geographically constrained. Additionally, stream and river systems have been understudied as compared to lakes.

Empirical correspondence between trophic transfer efficiency in freshwater food webs and the slope of their size spectra.

The density of organisms declines with size, because larger organisms need more energy than smaller ones and energetic losses occur when larger organisms feed on smaller ones. A potential expression of density-size distributions are Normalized Biomass Size Spectra (NBSS), which plot the logarithm of biomass independent of taxonomy within bins of logarithmic organismal size, divided by the bin width. Theoretically, the NBSS slope of multi-trophic communities is exactly -1.

DNA metabarcoding of unfractionated water samples relates phyto-, zoo- and bacterioplankton dynamics and reveals a single-taxon bacterial bloom.

Most studies of aquatic plankton focus on either macroscopic or microbial communities, and on either eukaryotes or prokaryotes. This separation is primarily for methodological reasons, but can overlook potential interactions among groups. Here we tested whether DNA metabarcoding of unfractionated water samples with universal primers could be used to qualitatively and quantitatively study the temporal dynamics of the total plankton community in a shallow temperate lake.

Shifts among Eukaryota, Bacteria, and Archaea define the vertical organization of a lake sediment.

Background: Lake sediments harbor diverse microbial communities that cycle carbon and nutrients while being constantly colonized and potentially buried by organic matter sinking from the water column. The interaction of activity and burial remained largely unexplored in aquatic sediments. We aimed to relate taxonomic composition to sediment biogeochemical parameters, test whether community turnover with depth resulted from taxonomic replacement or from richness effects, and to provide a basic model for the vertical community structure in sediments.

Effects of light and autochthonous carbon additions on microbial turnover of allochthonous organic carbon and community composition.

The fate of allochthonous dissolved organic carbon (DOC) in aquatic systems is primarily controlled by the turnover of heterotrophic bacteria. However, the roles that abiotic and biotic factors such as light and DOC release by aquatic primary producers play in the microbial decomposition of allochthonous DOC is not well understood. We therefore tested if light and autochthonous DOC additions would increase allochthonous DOC decomposition rates and change bacterial growth efficiencies and community composition (BCC).

Ecosystem-level studies of terrestrial carbon reveal contrasting bacterial metabolism in different aquatic habitats.

In aquatic systems, terrestrial dissolved organic matter (t-DOM) is known to stimulate bacterial activities in the water column, but simultaneous effects of autumnal leaf input on water column and sediment microbial dynamics in littoral zones of lakes remain largely unknown. The study's objective was to determine the effects of leaf litter on bacterial metabolism in the littoral water and sediment, and subsequently, the consequences for carbon cycling and food web dynamics. Therefore, in late fall, we simultaneously measured water and sediment bacterial metabolism in the littoral zone of a temperate shallow lake after adding terrestrial particulate organic matter (t-POM), namely, maize leaves.