The project, entitled "Arctic ostracods and copepods of the hyporheic zone in Swedish Lapland – assemblages’ resilience and shell chemistry" will begin in July, 2014.

The project, entitled "Arctic ostracods and copepods of the hyporheic zone in Swedish Lapland – assemblages’ resilience and shell chemistry", is led by Sanda Iepure, researcher at the IMDEA Water Institute and will begin in July, 2014.

It  aims at documenting the changes in environmental parameters that affect the hyporheic biota in pro-glacial streams from the Arctic region. The ecological research serves as a model to investigate the effects of climate changes on Arctic rivers, by screenings a set of variables directly linked to key components of these ecosystems: abiotic (i.e. hydrological/thermal conditions, water quality, permafrost extent, local/regional climate) and biotic assemblages (diversity, structural pattern/age, growth rates, life cycle stages). The exploratory research is a contribution to the global effort in advancing our understanding of Arctic streams ecosystems and biodiversity.

The study will be performed on two pro-glacial streams from Storglaciaren valley; Tarfala Research Station, Sweden (http://www.eu-interact.org/field-sites/sweden-2/tarfala/).

The research team is formed by Dr. Sanda Iepure (IMDEA Water, Spain), Dr. Tadeusz Namiotko (University of Gdansk, Poland) and Dr. Francisco Javier Lillo Ramos (University Rey Juan Carlos, Spain).

This project is funded by the EU through the International Network for Terrestrial Research and Monitoring in the Arctic (INTERACT), which has a main objective to build capacity for identifying, understanding, predicting and responding to diverse environmental changes throughout the wide environmental and land-use envelopes of the Arctic.