CattailInMainePond-07Because of Limno Consulting's recent estab-lishment, the list of ongoing projects is forcedly short.  While ideas for collaborative project proposals are produced at an intense pace, most current activities are mainly research-oriented projects commenced before the official establishment of Limno Consulting.

Limno Consulting is currently involved in the final stages of dissemination of the results from the Steinsfjord project, targeting the spreading of the nonnative invasive macrophyte species Elodea canadensis in (Lake) Steinsfjord, a large, clear-water, species-rich lake in southeastern Norway.  The Steinsfjord project leader is the Norwegian Institute for Water Research, or NIVA, with funding from the Norwegian Research Council.  The project main objective is to monitor the status of E. canadensis some 15 years after the initial biomass peak in the 1980s.  Field data on macrophyte distribution, from the surface to maximum colonization depth at ~6 m, were collected by NIVA SCUBA divers in 2003-2004, with the first scientific article recently published (Mjelde et al. 2012).  The Steinsfjord project included information on other biological components such as waterfowl and phyto- and zooplankton, but Limno Consulting was involved only in the subprojects about macrophytes.

Other collaborations with NIVA include the production of scientific articles describing past joint projects, mainly on macrophyte ecology and macrophyte–phytoplankton interactions.  More recent, ongoing collaborations target the production, validation, and/or calibration of macLakeOrtarophyte-based limnological indices to be used for the assessment of ecosystem ecological status within the context of the European Union's Water Framework Directive (WFD).  Much of such index-oriented work also is expected to be eventually published in peer-reviewed, scientific articles.

Recent and ongoing collaborations with the University of L'Aquila, especially with the Ecology Lab of Prof. Bruno Cicolani, center on the expertise area common to both the Ecology Lab and Limno Consulting: freshwater benthic macroinvertebrates.  While the as yet unpublished results of recently completed research are being elaborated and organized into scientific articles, new ideas are continuously developed.  Limno Consulting typically produces and manages projects focused on lake gastropods, while the Ecology Lab takes the lead on projects on stream water mites and macroinvertebrate communities at large.  The ongoing, active collaboration with Prof. Cicolani's Ecology Lab includes both basic ecology and applied-research projects.  The latter include the development of macro-invertebrate-based environmental indices to fulfill WFD requirements (e.g., Miccoli et al. 2013).

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Limno Consulting has recently started a collaboration also with Prof. Diana M.P. Galassi of the University of L'Aquila, whose main area of expertise is basic and applied aspects of groundwater crustacean fauna.  Dr. Paola Lombardo of Limno Consulting is an active participant in the EU-funded AQUALIFE Project, with Prof. Galassi as the scientific director.  The project's main aim is the development of an user-friendly indicator system to evaluate faunal biodiversity in relation to land use and human activities in groundwater-dependent ecosystems (GDEs), with a focus on groundwater ecosystems sensu strictu.  Dr. Lombardo's duties focus on data analysis and report and article preparation based on the data collected by the staff at Prof. Galassi's Stygobiology Lab.  Data collection is under way, and an article has already been produced using recent historical data (Galassi et al. 2014).  More articles, with historical and current data, are expected to be completed and submitted in the next few months.  Please check out the AQUALIFE Website (in Italian and English; opens in new window) and the Pubs tab from the top banner for updates in this regard.

A project under development with the landscaping firm Cepurica of Rome targets a "green", environmentally sustainable way to control nuisance mosquitoes in the mosquito-infested southwestern suburbs of Rome, also home to a large and aggressive population of the nonnative tiger mosquito (Aedes albopictus).

Limno Consulting uses AddinsoftTM XLSTAT for statistical elaboration of data in all consulting and research projects.

Details and updates on recent and current collaborative projects are available under the Research tab above.

Limno Consulting di Paola Lombardo

Via Bedollo 303, I-00124 Rome, Italy • +39 331 296-0797
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