Search results for "Ecological engineering"

Letter to the editor regarding the article “Taking advantage of seagrass recovery potential to develop novel and effective meadow rehabilitation meth…

2020

Alagna et al. (2019) suggest new transplantation methods for Posidonia oceanica (Linnaeus) Delile, inspired by its natural recovery process after disturbance due to dredging operations for gas-pipelines. They observe that P. oceanica vegetative fragments naturally settled only on loose calcareous stones deployed to fill the trenches of the gas-pipeline. No recovery was noted on dead matte, sand and large calcarenitic boulders. Following a new pilot restoration project currently ongoing in the same area, we demonstrate that natural recovery also occurs on dead matte. After examining other alternative transplantation methods for P. oceanica, the Authors suggest using their "habitat enhancemen…

Woody Plant Declines. What’s Wrong with the Microbiome?

2020

National audience; Woody plant (WP) declines have multifactorial determinants as well as a biological and economic reality. The vascular system of WPs involved in the transport of carbon, nitrogen, and water from sources to sinks has a seasonal activity, which places it at a central position for mediating plant–environment interactions from nutrient cycling to community assembly and for regulating a variety of processes. To limit effects and to fight against declines, we propose: (i) to consider the WP and its associated microbiota as an holobiont and as a set of functions; (ii) to consider simultaneously, without looking at what comes first, the physiological or pathogenic disorders; and (…

Tracking management-related water quality alterations by phytoplankton assemblages in a tropical reservoir

2015

Water quality improvement and suppression of cyanobacterial blooms were planned in a eutrophic reservoir in southern China through ecological engineering measures from 2006 to 2011. This consisted in (i) a hydraulic resetting of inflows and outflows to increase the distance between inlet and outlet and the water residence time in the reservoir, and in (ii) the installation of floating frames hosting wetland vegetation to promote an alteration in phytoplankton composition. The environmental changes were therefore followed through the analysis of biotic responses in phytoplankton assemblages. Ecological engineering was effective in reducing phytoplankton total biomass, in re-establishing more…

Getting into the groove: Opportunities to enhance the ecological value of hard coastal infrastructure using fine-scale surface textures

2015

Concrete flood defences, erosion control structures, port and harbour facilities, and renewable energy infrastructure are increasingly being built in the world’s coastal regions. There is, however, strong evidence to suggest that these structures are poor surrogates for natural rocky shores, often supporting assemblages with lower species abundance and diversity. Ecological engineering opportunities to enhance structures for biodiversity conservation (and other management goals) are therefore being sought, but the majority of work so far has concentrated on structural design features at the centimetre–meter scale.\ud \ud We deployed concrete tiles with four easily-reproducible fine-scale (m…

Eco-Technology and Eco-Innovation for Green Sustainable Growth

2021

The First Forty Years of a Technosol

2009

Abstract Soil formation is often a very slow process that requires thousands and even millions of years. Human influence, occasionally on a par with the function of climate or geological forces, can accelerate the process and can be viewed as a distinct soil forming factor. This paper describes a soil, Haplic Regosol, in which anthrosolization dominates the soil forming process. Man-made soils, Technosols, were stabilized with techniques of ecological engineering (crib walls). We measured the main soil properties and focused on the movement of water (the reduction of soil weight is the key factor in stabilizing these calcschists). The newly deposited debris, sheltered by anthropic intervent…

IoT monitoring of urban tree ecosystem services: Possibilities and challenges

2020

Urban green infrastructure plays an increasingly significant role in sustainable urban development planning as it provides important regulating and cultural ecosystem services. Monitoring of such dynamic and complex systems requires technological solutions which provide easy data collection, processing, and utilization at affordable costs. To meet these challenges a pilot study was conducted using a network of wireless, low cost, and multiparameter monitoring devices, which operate using Internet of Things (IoT) technology, to provide real-time monitoring of regulatory ecosystem services in the form of meaningful indicators for both human health and environmental policies. The pilot study w…

Soils as a key component of the critical zone 6 : ecology

2018

Prod 2018-76h équipe EA SPE BIOME INRA AGROSUP; International audience

Intérêt d'aménagements paysagers pour la biodiversité : exemple d'ingénierie agroécologique sur le domaine expérimental d'Epoisses (Inra Dijon)

2013

The biodiversity conservation is one of the major agricultural issues of the XXIst century. The intensification of agriculture and the redesign of the agricultural landscape (grouping of fields, …) lead to huge decreases or damages of semi-naturals habitats, known to promote biodiversity at the farm and the landscape scale, and now recognised as “topographic surface equivalence” in France.In the experimental site of Epoisses (INRA of Dijon), a study to design the landscape elements in favour of the biodiversity has been initiated. Improving the management of existing habitats (woods, hedges, ditches, sown grass margin strips), establishing hedges, flower strips, redesigning the field organi…

Microorganisms and Biotic Interactions

2014

SPE IPM; Most ecosystems are populated by a large number of diversified microorganisms, which interact with one another and form complex interaction networks. In addition, some of these microorganisms may colonize the surface or internal parts of plants and animals, thereby providing an additional level of interaction complexity. These microbial relations range from intraspecific to interspecific interactions, and from simple short-term interactions to intricate long-term ones. They have played a key role in the formation of plant and animal kingdoms, often resulting in coevolution; they control the size, activity level, and diversity patterns of microbial communities. Therefore, they modul…