The full list of projects contains the entire database hosted on this portal, across the available directories. The projects and activities (across all directories/catalogs) are also available by country of origin, by geographical region, or by directory.
To provide the data necessary for quantifying the dynamics of arctic ecosystems, i.e. at the two field sites at respectively Zackenberg (Northeast Greenland) and Nuuk (West Greenland) Main gaps: Winter dynamics
The objective of the station is to facilitate ecosystem research in the High Arctic. According to the framework programme of Zackenberg Ecological Research Operations (ZERO) this includes: - Basic quantitative documentation of ecosystem structure and processes; - Baseline studies of intrinsic short-term and long-term variations in ecosystem functions; - Retrospective analyses of organic and inorganic material to detect past ecosystem changes; - Experimental studies enabling predictions of ecosystem responses to Global Change. The programme is coordinated with Nuuk Ecological Research Operations (see below) within the Framework of Greenland Ecosystem Monitoring (GEM). Main gaps: Winter dynamics
The objective is to allow comparative studies of ecosystem dynamics in relation to climate variability and change in respectively a high arctic and low arctic setting as Nuuk Basic comprises the same components as Zackenberg. According to the framework programme of Zackenberg Ecological Research Operations (ZERO) this includes: - Basic quantitative documentation of ecosystem structure and processes; - Baseline studies of intrinsic short-term and long-term variations in ecosystem functions; - Retrospective analyses of organic and inorganic material to detect past ecosystem changes; - Experimental studies enabling predictions of ecosystem responses to Global Change. The programme is coordinated with Zackenberg Ecological Research Operations (see above) within the Framework of Greenland Ecosystem Monitoring (GEM). Main gaps: Winter dynamics
In 2013 a new ecosystem monitoring programme “DiskoBasis” was initiated at Arctic Station on Disko Island, Greenland. The project is partly funded by the Danish Energy Agency. The primary objective of DiskoBasis is to establish baseline knowledge on the dynamics of fundamental physical parameters within the environment/ecosystem around Arctic Station. This initiative extends and complements the existing monitoring carried out at Arctic Station by including several new activities –especially within the terrestrial and hydrological/fluvial field. DiskoBasis include collection of data in the following sub-topics; • Gas flux, meteorology and energy balance • Snow, ice and permafrost • Soil and soil water chemistry • Vegetation phenology • Hydrology -River water discharge and chemistry • Limnology -Lake water chemistry • Marine -Sea water chemistry
The GeoBasis programme collects data describing the physical and geomorphological environment in Zackenberg, North East Greenland. This includes meteorology, carbon flux and energy exchange, snow cover and permafrost, soil moisture, –chemistry and nutrient balance, hydrology, river discharge and – sediment
The purpose of the BioBasis programme is to monitor basic qualitative and quantitative elements of biodiversity in the terrestrial ecosystems at Zackenberg in Northeast Greenland. The programme provides data on typical High Arctic species and processes that can be expected to react on year to year variation in climate as well as long-term climate change. It includes 30 variables of terrestrial and limnic plant, arthropod, bird and mammal dynamics in the Zackenberg valley.
The project is a continuation of the monitoring activities of the AMAP POPs and Heavy metals programme in marine, terrestrial and freshwater environments of the Faroe Islands. The aims of the programme is to establish data for timetrend and spatial assessments as well as providing data of importance in human health risk assessment on mercury and POPs. The programme incorporates analyses on pilot whale, cod, black guillemots from the marine environment, sheep and hare from the terrestrial environment and arctic char from the freshwater environment. The compounds analysed are "legacy" POPs and mercury, cadmium and selenium. In addition, PBDEs are analysed in pilot whale tissues to add to previously established time-trend series.
The project is a continuation of the monitoring activities of the AMAP POPs and Heavy metals programme in marine, terrestrial and freshwater environments of the Faroe Islands. The aims of the programme is to establish data for timetrend and spatial assessments as well as providing data of importance in human health risk assessment on mercury and POPs. The programme incorporates analyses on pilot whale, cod, and black guillemots from the marine environment, sheep from the terrestrial environment and arctic char from the freshwater environment. The compounds analysed are "legacy" POPs and mercury, cadmium and selenium. In addition, PFAS and PBDEs were analysed in pilot whale tissues, to add to previously established time-trend series.
The project is a continuation of the monitoring activities of the AMAP POPs and Heavy metals programme in marine, terrestrial and freshwater environments of the Faroe Islands. The aims of the programme is to establish data for timetrend and spatial assessments as well as providing data of importance in human health risk assessment on mercury and POPs. The programme incorporates analyses on pilot whale, cod, black guillemots and Northern fulmars from the marine environment, sheep from the terrestrial environment and arctic char from the freshwater environment. The compounds analysed are "legacy" POPs and mercury, cadmium and selenium. In addition, PFAS and HBDCs are analysed in pilot whale as a continuation of timetrend analyses, initialized in previous projects, and PFAS are analysed in Northern fulmar tissues from the last ten years.
The project is a continuation of the monitoring activities of the AMAP POPs and Heavy metals programme in marine, terrestrial and freshwater environments of the Faroe Islands. The aims of the programme is to establish data for timetrend and spatial assessments as well as providing data of importance in human health risk assessment on mercury and POPs. The programme incorporates analyses on pilot whale, cod, and black guillemots from the marine environment, sheep from the terrestrial environment and arctic char from the freshwater environment. The compounds analysed are "legacy" POPs and mercury, cadmium and selenium. In addition, a retrospective analysis of HBCD in pilot whale tissues, going back to 1986, is part of the project.
MOSJ (Environmental Monitoring of Svalbard and Jan Mayen) is an environmental monitoring system and part of the Government’s environmental monitoring in Norway. An important function is to provide a basis for seeing whether the political targets set for the development of the environment in the North are being attained
Measurements of gamma-radiation in the environment (from ground to cosmos). Radioactivity in Intensive Net is measured on the soil surface at 28 sites in Sweden. The measurements are continuous and sound the alarm if radioactivity increases. Measured is the dose rate of gamma radiation. Radioactivity in Extensive Net is concerned all municipalities in Sweden which has got one instrument for gamma radiation measurement and each county board has got two. Every seventh month they measure radioactivity at two to four predefined spots as reference measurement. Radioactivity in Air is conducted at five stations with air filter sampling and analysis of radioactivity maintained by Swedish Defence Research Agency (FOI). Out of these stations Umeå and Kiruna are located in northern Sweden.
National Monitoring Programme in Sweden. The purpose is to quantify deposition (mainly of sulphur and nitrogen), and to illustrate effects in the soil, for example possible acidification. The aim of the network is to describe the current situation, regional differences, trends over time, and the effects of acid deposition. The atmospheric deposition of sulphur and nitrogen are the main causes of current acidification of ecosystems. Acidification results in substantial pH reduction in soil, groundwater, lakes and water courses. Deposition is investigated as precipitation studies in open field areas (bulk precipitation) and by throughfall studies in nearby forest stands. For sulphur and chloride, throughfall monitoring is useful for determination of total deposition. In areas, or during periods with low sulphur deposition, internal circulation in vegetation might influence results from throughfall measurements significantly. For nitrogen and base cations (mainly potassium and manganese) canopy interaction is important. Air concentrations of sulphur and nitrogen dioxide, ammonia, and ozone are measured at some locations. The observations made are: (i) air chemistry (SO2, NO2, NH3, O3); (ii) soil water chemistry (pH, Alk, SO4-S, Cl, NO3-N, NH4-N, Ca, Mg, Na, K, Mn, Fe, ooAl, oAl, Al-tot, total organic carbon); (iii) deposition in open field (precipitation, H+, SO4-S, Cl, NO3-N, NH4-N, Ca, Mg, Na, K, Mn); (iv) deposition in forest (throughfall, H+, SO4-S, Cl, NO3-N, NH4-N, Ca, Mg, Na, K, Mn). For nitrogen and base cations (mainly potassium and manganese) canopy interaction is important. Soil solution chemistry in the forest stands is used as indicator of soil conditions.
This project was previously a part of the project: National Survey of Forest Soils and Vegetation.
The Swedish National Forest Inventory (NFI) has the task of describing the state and changes of Sweden's forests. The inventory gathers basic information on forests, forest stand conditions and vegetation. Regularly monitored variables are: forest state, injuries, growth, logging operations, new forest stand, and environmental assessment. There is a close collaboration between the NFI and the Swedish Forest Soil Inventory (SFSI).
This project has been divided into two new projects: The Swedish Forest Soil Inventory and the Swedish National Forest Inventory.
The Swedish National Forest Inventory has the task of describing the state and changes in Sweden's forests. The inventory gathers basic information on forests, soils and vegetation. It includes most aspects concerning soils, for example: soil types, soil chemistry including organic matter, water conditions and content of stones and boulders. Acidification, nitrogen deposition and the contribution by soils to climate change are some of the current issues dealt with. Regularly reported variables are: forest state, injuries, and growth, logging operations, new forest stand, and environmental assessment. Invented variables on permanent sampling plots include: position in the landscape, field vegetation, site conditions, soil sampling, assesment of soil characteristics, chemical analysis of soil in O-, B-, BC- and C-horizons.
This project was previously a part of the project: National Survey of Forest Soils and Vegetation.
The Swedish Forest Soil Inventory (SFSI) is part of the national environmental monitoring programme Forests and collects information about soil conditions and chemistry from around 23 500 permanent plots throughout Sweden. One tenth of these sampling plots are re-visited each year. The inventory is commissioned by the Swedish Environmental Protection Agency and is carried out by the Department of Soil and Environment at the Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences (SLU).
The inventory gathers basic information on soils and vegetation on predominantly forest land, but also semi-natural grassland and wetland below the alpine forest limit. It includes most aspects concerning soils, for example: soil types, soil chemistry including organic matter, water conditions and content of stones and boulders. Acidification, nitrogen deposition and the contribution by soils to climate change are some of the current issues dealt with. There is a close collaboration between the SFSI and the National Forest Inventory (NFI), and the inventoried plots are a subset of the NFI plots. .
National Environmental Monitoring Programme in Sweden. The objective is to follow the deposition of heavy metals over Sweden by the analyses of their concentration in two selected species of moss. The selected species are: Red-stemmed Feather-moss (Pleurozium schreberi) and Mountain Fern Moss (Hylocomnium splendens). Preferred specie: Red-stemmed Feather-moss (Pleurozium schreberi). Metals adsorbed by mosses almost exclusively come from the air and metal concentration in mosses are therefore seen as a proxy for metal deposition. Analysed elements are: Al, As, Cd, Co, Cr, Cu, Fe, Hg, Mn, Mo, Ni, Pb, V, Zn (2015). The moss samples are taken from over 600 stands across Sweden.
National Environmental Monitoring Programme in Sweden. The objective of the project is to follow time trends of available metals in vegetation and reindeer (Rangifer tarandus) in Lapland, Sweden. Analysed metals in liver and muscle samples are: Al, Cd, Co, Cr, Cu, Mg, Mn, Ni,Hg, Pb, Zn. Analyses were performed on a continuous basis until 2005. Since then there has only been a collection of samples to be stored in the Environmental Specimen Bank (ESB) at the Swedish Museum of Natural History (NRM).
Ice sheet meltwater and sediment discharge is measured at only very few sites in Greenland. The measurements provide detailed insights into ice sheet surface melting, englacial meltwater routing, subglacial erosion, etc., and their importance increase with the lengthening of the time series. Monitoring was initiated by IGN (Copenhagen University) in 2006, and taken over by the Geological Survey of Denmark and Greenland in 2014. Data are available through the Programme for Monitoring of the Greenland Ice Sheet (www.PROMICE.dk).
Important progress has been made in recent decades to describe and understand how arctic terrestrial vertebrate interact, especially concerning predator-prey interactions. Indirect interactions between different prey species modulated by shared predators (e.g. Arctic fox) are believed to have important impacts on the structure and/or dynamics of some communities. Yet, our understanding of these types of interactions is still fragmentary. To fill that gap, we will build on ongoing projects exploring related questions in Canada (Marie-Andrée Giroux, Nicolas Lecomte, Joël Bêty) and Greenland (Olivier Gilg, Niels M. Schmidt), while taking advantage of existing networks (ADSN in North America and “Interactions” program in Greenland and Eurasia). The aim of the project is to promote the implementation of several common protocols that will (1) improve each collaborator’s knowledge at the site level and, more importantly, that will (2) be merged across sites and years to improve our understanding of the functioning and the influence of indirect interactions on arctic vertebrate communities in general.
Five types of data have been identified (by the 5 initiators of the project already mentioned above) as being mandatories to answer questions related to this topic. These data sets will be collected using 5 specific protocols described in the following chapters: