Objective
Over 40.000 wildfires occur yearly in Mediterranean Europe causing devastating environmental damages: greenhouse gas emission, habitat destruction and accelerated desertification. Burning can sterilize the soil surface within minutes, whereas the recovery of the decomposer system and its ecosystem functions can take decades. Our knowledge on the effects of fire on the decomposer system mostly relies on surveys performed in humid climates. Thus, it is intended in this proposal to survey the fire-induced changes in the soil microbiota in Mediterranean forests. In particular we aim to: i) Analyse the effects of an experimentally controlled wildfire in a Mediterranean shrubland on the soil´s physical and chemical properties, as well as microbial biomass (microbial C content), activity (ATP content and respiration), ability to consume a range of C substrates (MicroResp), and several hydrolases linked to the C, N and P cycles, ii) Investigate fire as an ecological filter selecting for endosporulating bacterial groups. We will analyse the bacterial community structure (denaturing gradient gel electrophoresis of 16S rRNA gene amplicons) in pre- and post-fire samples. Based on these results, adequate samples will be selected for generating clone libraries to construct the phylogeny of the regional bacterial community. We expect that endosporulating bacteria, with their higher resistance to heating, will be overrepresented in the post-fire community, what will be analysed using the picante library of R. If demonstrated, this would imply the loss of phylogenetic diversity, which is the key component of biodiversity determining the ecosystem functioning, iii) Evaluate the restoration of soil properties after applying exogenous organic matter. We will investigate in a microcosm experiment whether the addition of composts accelerates the recovery of the pre-fire microbially-mediated ecosystem processes.
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.
- natural sciences biological sciences biological morphology comparative morphology
- natural sciences biological sciences microbiology microbiomes
- natural sciences biological sciences ecology ecosystems
- natural sciences chemical sciences electrochemistry electrophoresis
- natural sciences biological sciences microbiology bacteriology bacteriomes
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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.
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.
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.
FP7-PEOPLE-2009-RG
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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.
Coordinator
28006 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.