Methane (CH4) and nitrous oxide (N2O) emissions from productive aquatic ecosystems contribute globally to greenhouse effect and as a consequence they influence climate warming. In the last decades greenhouse gases emissions have substantially increased mainly because of human impact on ecosystems have intensified considerably. Benthic environments (lake- and sea-floors) are very important ecosystems, where a substantial part of the organic matter produced in, or driven to, the aquatic systems is remineralized into nutrients and elements. Benthic infauna has an essential role in sediment reworking, therefore favoring mineralization and oxidation of metabolites. Ecosystem stresses such as eutrophication, hypoxia/anoxia, biological invasions, climate warming, etc., have been shown to deeply alter benthic faunal communities. However, it is still unclear which feedback these affected benthic communities could have on that long list of stresses and, in particular, on gas emissions and related global warming.

In this project we want to conduct a systematic study to investigate the contribution of common Baltic Sea infauna taxa and biological invaders that recently colonized the Baltic Sea sediments to nitrogen (N) and carbon (C) cycling, in the form of N and C gas emissions.

Lead scientists

Stefano Bonaglia (PhD), Alessandra Vicenzi (master student) and Volker Brüchert (supervisor) Geological Sciences, Stockholm University (other members: Francisco Nascimento, Nils Ekeroth, Caroline Raymond, Jonas Gunnarsson, all at the Department of Ecology, Environment and Plant Sciences, Stockholm University)