Department Systems Analysis, Integrated Assessment and Modelling

Aquatic ecosystems are rich in biodiversity and home to a diverse array of species and habitats, providing numerous economic and social benefits to Europe. Many of these valuable ecosystems are currently at significant risk of being irreversibly damaged by human activities and by the numerous pressures these create, including pollution, contamination, invasive species, overfishing and climate change.

Knowledge, Assessment, and Management for AQUAtic Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services aCROSS EU policies (AQUACROSS) aims to support EU efforts to protect aquatic biodiversity and ensure the provision of aquatic ecosystem services. Funded by Europe’s Horizon 2020 research programme, AQUACROSS seeks to advance knowledge and application of ecosystem-based management (EBM) for aquatic ecosystems to support the timely achievement of the EU 2020 Biodiversity Strategy targets. See http://www.aquacross.eu for more details.

We are primarily contributing by case study 7 and by methodological aspects of modelling and decision support to AQUACROSS. The aim of this case study is to develop a probability network model for the response of invertebrate and fish communities to human impacts in Swiss rivers and to apply this model with a multi-attribute decision analysis (MCDA) framework to river management.

References

Vermeiren, P.; Reichert, P.; Graf, W.; Leitner, P.; Schmidt-Kloiber, A.; Schuwirth, N. (2021) Confronting existing knowledge on ecological preferences of stream macroinvertebrates with independent monitoring data using a Bayesian multi-species distribution model, Freshwater Science, doi:10.1086/713175, Institutional Repository

Vermeiren, P., Reichert, P., Schuwirth, N. (2020): Integrating uncertain prior knowledge regarding ecological preferences into multi-species distribution models: effects of model complexity on predictive performance, Ecological Modelling, 420, 108956 (15 pp.), https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ecolmodel.2020.108956 (open access)

Kuemmerlen, M., Reichert, P., Siber, R., Schuwirth, N. (2019): Ecological assessment of river networks: from reach to catchment scale. Science of the Total Environment 650:1613–1627. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.scitotenv.2018.09.019 (open access)

Reichert, P., Langhans, S., Lienert, J. and Schuwirth, N. (2015): The Conceptual Foundation of Environmental Decision Support. Journal of Environmental Management 154, 316-332. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jenvman.2015.01.053  (open access)

Reichert, P., Schuwirth, N. and Langhans, S. (2013): Constructing, evaluating and visualizing value and utility functions for decision support, Environmental Modelling & Software 46, 283-291. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.envsoft.2013.01.017

Team

Dr. Mathias Kuemmerlen, Postdoc, January 2017 - March 2019
Dr. Peter Vermeiren, Postdoc, January 2016 - December 2017
Prof. Dr. Peter Reichert
Dr. Nele Schuwirth