Project description
Nature-based mechanisms to combat desertification
Resilience is the capacity of ecosystems to withstand disturbances, a crucial trait for adapting to climate change and increasing aridity. This is especially vital for drylands, where crossing aridity thresholds can lead to sudden, dramatic shifts. However, limited knowledge of resilience in these regions hampers efforts to restore and protect degraded ecosystems. The ERC-funded INERTIA project will combine long-term experiments, remote sensing and global field surveys to investigate resilience across ecosystems, with a focus on global aridity thresholds. It aims to better understand the complex nature of resilience, refine remote sensing techniques, identify critical drivers at various organisational levels and support ecosystem restoration in arid areas.
Objective
Resilience (the ability of ecosystems to withstand disturbances without losing its structural or functional properties) is crucial to confront changes imposed by climate change such as ongoing increases in aridity. This is especially relevant for drylands, which have been shown to exhibit abrupt changes in their structure and functioning once that certain aridity thresholds are crossed. However, we have very little understanding on the drivers and patterns of resilience around aridity thresholds, which hinders our ability to monitor, preserve and restore degraded ecosystems under climate change. Existing uncertainties arise from the complexity of studying resilience (which is multifaceted concept and operates at contrasting levels of organization of ecosystems), and from the lack of studies addressing the resilience of drylands around and across aridity thresholds. INERTIA will combine long-term experiments, remote sensing, multiple spatiotemporal scales and global field surveys to address all facets of resilience across contrasting levels of organization of ecosystems around and across global aridity thresholds. In particular, I aim to: i) evaluate the multi-faceted nature of resilience to boost remote sensing monitoring schemes, ii) unveil drivers of global resilience across levels of organization (from climatic to physiological drivers), specifically around aridity thresholds and iii) evaluate and improve our capacity to restore ecosystems across aridity thresholds. By doing so, INERTIA will provide cutting-edge advances in our understanding of resilience and its potential to monitor, evade and recover from abrupt shifts triggered by crossing aridity thresholds. The knowledge gained by INERTIA will underpin international initiatives aimed at mitigating global change and desertification or restoring degraded drylands and may open new research avenues on ecology of ecosystems at the edge of thresholds, a topic of increasing relevance due to ongoing climate change.
Fields of science (EuroSciVoc)
CORDIS classifies projects with EuroSciVoc, a multilingual taxonomy of fields of science, through a semi-automatic process based on NLP techniques. See: The European Science Vocabulary.
CORDIS classifies projects with EuroSciVoc, a multilingual taxonomy of fields of science, through a semi-automatic process based on NLP techniques. See: The European Science Vocabulary.
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Keywords
Project’s keywords as indicated by the project coordinator. Not to be confused with the EuroSciVoc taxonomy (Fields of science)
Project’s keywords as indicated by the project coordinator. Not to be confused with the EuroSciVoc taxonomy (Fields of science)
Programme(s)
Multi-annual funding programmes that define the EU’s priorities for research and innovation.
Multi-annual funding programmes that define the EU’s priorities for research and innovation.
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HORIZON.1.1 - European Research Council (ERC)
MAIN PROGRAMME
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Topic(s)
Calls for proposals are divided into topics. A topic defines a specific subject or area for which applicants can submit proposals. The description of a topic comprises its specific scope and the expected impact of the funded project.
Calls for proposals are divided into topics. A topic defines a specific subject or area for which applicants can submit proposals. The description of a topic comprises its specific scope and the expected impact of the funded project.
Funding Scheme
Funding scheme (or “Type of Action”) inside a programme with common features. It specifies: the scope of what is funded; the reimbursement rate; specific evaluation criteria to qualify for funding; and the use of simplified forms of costs like lump sums.
Funding scheme (or “Type of Action”) inside a programme with common features. It specifies: the scope of what is funded; the reimbursement rate; specific evaluation criteria to qualify for funding; and the use of simplified forms of costs like lump sums.
HORIZON-ERC - HORIZON ERC Grants
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Call for proposal
Procedure for inviting applicants to submit project proposals, with the aim of receiving EU funding.
Procedure for inviting applicants to submit project proposals, with the aim of receiving EU funding.
(opens in new window) ERC-2024-STG
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Net EU financial contribution. The sum of money that the participant receives, deducted by the EU contribution to its linked third party. It considers the distribution of the EU financial contribution between direct beneficiaries of the project and other types of participants, like third-party participants.
28040 MADRID
Spain
The total costs incurred by this organisation to participate in the project, including direct and indirect costs. This amount is a subset of the overall project budget.