The study: Biodiversity of European rivers
The macroinvertebrate research group at Eurac Research’s Institute for Alpine Environment participated in an international study on the ecological quality of Europe’s rivers, published last August in the journal Nature. The authors of the research analyzed data on 2648 macroinvertebrate species, collected between 1968 to 2020 at 1816 sites scattered across 22 countries. What emerges is that after a period of biodiversity recovery that took place in the 1990s and early 2000s, this recovery has slowed dramatically. According to experts, for river biodiversity to return, new efforts are needed that consider emerging problems, particularly climate change, new pollutants and the spread of invasive species.
The study can be downloaded here: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41586-023-06400-1