Descrizione del progetto
I cambiamenti climatici si ripercuotono sulla tossicità della proliferazione cianobatterica
Le proliferazioni di cianobatteri fotosintetici che producono tossine nocive minacciano la qualità idrica e la salute umana. È previsto un loro aumento dovuto ai cambiamenti climatici. La tossicità della proliferazione si verifica su scale diverse, dall’accumulo di biomasse alla dominanza di specie e genotipi tossici, passando per la produzione di tossine cellulari. Il progetto BLOOMTOX, finanziato dall’UE, si propone di comprendere i meccanismi di tossicità della proliferazione, studiando su ogni scala gli effetti combinati di sostanze nutritive, livelli elevati di anidride carbonica e riscaldamento. Grazie a un canale di citometria a flusso ad alte prestazioni e una nuova piattaforma sperimentale lab-on-a-chip, BLOOMTOX condurrà una massiccia valutazione parallela delle principali caratteristiche competitive nelle varie specie di fitoplancton e i diversi genotipi cianobatterici. Insieme a una combinazione di approcci di scalabilità, ciò fornirà una comprensione meccanicistica della tossicità delle proliferazioni cianobatteriche e della loro risposta ai cambiamenti climatici globali.
Obiettivo
Harmful cyanobacterial blooms produce toxins that are a major threat to water quality and human health. Blooms increase with eutrophication and are expected to be amplified by climate change. Yet, we lack a mechanistic understanding on the toxicity of blooms, and their response to the complex interplay of multiple global change factors. Bloom toxicity is determined by a combination of mechanisms acting at different ecological scales, ranging from cyanobacterial biomass accumulation in the ecosystem, to the dominance of toxic species in the community, contribution of toxic genotypes in the population, and the amounts of toxins in cells. I will develop a fundamental understanding of bloom toxicity by revealing the combined effects of nutrients, elevated pCO2 and warming at each scale, and integrate these responses using a unique combination of ecological theory, technological advances, and methodological innovations. Specifically, I will use first principles to scale from cellular traits, like carbon and nutrient acquisition, cellular toxin synthesis and growth rates, to population and community dynamics. To enable rapid assessment of numerous cyanobacterial traits, I will set-up a high-throughput flow-cytometry pipeline. Also, I will develop a novel lab-on-a-chip experimental platform to allow massive parallel screening of key competitive traits in various phytoplankton species and cyanobacterial genotypes. To scale from these cellular traits to population and community interactions, I will study genotype selection and interspecific resource competition in state-of-the-art chemostats. I will further scale-up to natural communities in the field and in large-scale indoor mesocosms to assess global change impacts on the mechanisms underlying toxicity of (near) real-life blooms. With this unique combination of scaling approaches, I will provide a breakthrough in our mechanistic understanding on the toxicity of cyanobacterial blooms, and their response to global change.
Campo scientifico
- engineering and technologyother engineering and technologiesmicrotechnologylab on a chip
- natural sciencesearth and related environmental scienceshydrology
- natural sciencesbiological sciencesecologyecosystems
- natural sciencesearth and related environmental sciencesatmospheric sciencesclimatologyclimatic changes
- agricultural sciencesagricultural biotechnologybiomass
Parole chiave
Programma(i)
- HORIZON.1.1 - European Research Council (ERC) Main Programme
Argomento(i)
Meccanismo di finanziamento
HORIZON-ERC - HORIZON ERC GrantsIstituzione ospitante
1011 JV AMSTERDAM
Paesi Bassi