The Water Research Institute (Italian : Istituto di Ricerca sule Acque abbreviated IRSA) in Verbania Pallanza is part of the Water Research Institute of CNR, with headquarters in Rome. From 2002 to 2018 it represented the headquarters of the former Institute of Ecosystem Study (Italian : Istituto per lo Studio degli Ecosistemi, abbreviated ISE), one of the dismissed institutes of the Italian National Research Council (CNR). Before that, the institute in Verbania was called the Italian Institute of Hydrobiology.
Research at IRSA in Verbania is mostly on environmental issues, especially on:
The institute in Verbania Pallanza started working as a research center in 1938 on Lake Maggiore, as the Italian Institute of Hydrobiology, as a will of Rosa Curioni in memory of her husband, the limnologist Marco De Marchi, to whom the institute was dedicated.
During the Second World War life in the Institutes was difficult, due to economic shortages and lack of communication. Nevertheless, important scientists were based here during that time: Adriano Buzzati-Traverso, Luigi Luca Cavalli-Sforza, Vittorio Tonolli [1] and Giuseppe Ramazzotti. In 1944 the genetics section started working on Drosophila . After the war, research in the institute became more focused on freshwater ecology. Several limnologists passed through the institute, most notably: Ramon Margalef, G. Evelyn Hutchinson, Richard Vollenweider, Charles Goldman, Robert G. Wetzel [2] and W. Thomas Edmondson. [3]
The Institute entered CNR in 1977, and in 2002 ISE started its existence, with the inclusion of the units in Firenze, Pisa and Sassari. [4] From October 2018, the institute was dismantled and each of the research units of ISE was included in other institutes of CNR. The hearquarter in Verbania became part of the Water Research Institute, IRSA.
More than 2000 research papers have been published by the researchers of the institute, gathering more than 40,000 citations by the end of 2020. [5]
The Journal of Limnology is the official international journal of the CNR-IRSA in Verbania. It publishes papers on limnology. It started in 1999 as a continuation of the Memorie dell’Istituto Italiano di Idrobiologia (1942–1998). It is currently published by PAGEPress, [6] is completely free to read and is listed in the Directory of Open Access Journals (DOAJ). [7]
Limnology is the study of inland aquatic ecosystems. The study of limnology includes aspects of the biological, chemical, physical, and geological characteristics of fresh and saline, natural and man-made bodies of water. This includes the study of lakes, reservoirs, ponds, rivers, springs, streams, wetlands, and groundwater. Water systems are often categorized as either running (lotic) or standing (lentic).
Hydrobiology is the science of life and life processes in water. Much of modern hydrobiology can be viewed as a sub-discipline of ecology but the sphere of hydrobiology includes taxonomy, economic and industrial biology, morphology, and physiology. The one distinguishing aspect is that all fields relate to aquatic organisms. Most work is related to limnology and can be divided into lotic system ecology and lentic system ecology.
Gene Elden Likens is an American limnologist and ecologist. He co-founded the Hubbard Brook Ecosystem Study at the Hubbard Brook Experimental Forest in 1963, and founded the Cary Institute of Ecosystem Studies in Millbrook, New York in 1983.
Simon Asher Levin is an American ecologist and the James S. McDonnell Distinguished University Professor in Ecology and Evolutionary Biology and the director of the Center for BioComplexity at Princeton University. He specializes in using mathematical modeling and empirical studies in the understanding of macroscopic patterns of ecosystems and biological diversities.
The Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Biology is a German institute for evolutionary biology. It is located in Plön, Schleswig-Holstein, Germany.
Farooq Azam is a researcher in the field of marine microbiology. He is a distinguished professor at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography of the University of California, San Diego. Farooq Azam grew up in Lahore and received his early education in Lahore. He attended University of Punjab, where he received his B.Sc. in chemistry. He later he received his M.Sc. from the same institution. He then went to Czechoslovakia for higher studies. He received his PhD in microbiology from the Czechoslovak Academy of Sciences. After he received his PhD, Farooq Azam moved to California. Azam was the lead author on the paper which coined the term microbial loop. This 1983 paper involved a synthesis between a number of leaders in the (then) young field of microbial ecology, specifically, Azam, Tom Fenchel, J Field, J Gray, L Meyer-Reil and Tron Frede Thingstad.
Aquatic science is the study of the various bodies of water that make up our planet including oceanic and freshwater environments. Aquatic scientists study the movement of water, the chemistry of water, aquatic organisms, aquatic ecosystems, the movement of materials in and out of aquatic ecosystems, and the use of water by humans, among other things. Aquatic scientists examine current processes as well as historic processes, and the water bodies that they study can range from tiny areas measured in millimeters to full oceans. Moreover, aquatic scientists work in Interdisciplinary groups. For example, a physical oceanographer might work with a biological oceanographer to understand how physical processes, such as tropical cyclones or rip currents, affect organisms in the Atlantic Ocean. Chemists and biologists, on the other hand, might work together to see how the chemical makeup of a certain body of water affects the plants and animals that reside there. Aquatic scientists can work to tackle global problems such as global oceanic change and local problems, such as trying to understand why a drinking water supply in a certain area is polluted.
Hydrobiologia, The International Journal of Aquatic Sciences, is a peer-reviewed scientific journal publishing 21 issues per year, for a total of well over 4000 pages per year. Hydrobiologia publishes original research, reviews and opinions investigating the biology of freshwater and marine habitats, including the impact of human activities. Coverage includes molecular-, organism-, community -and ecosystem-level studies dealing with biological research in limnology and oceanography, including systematics and aquatic ecology. In addition to hypothesis-driven experimental research, it presents theoretical papers relevant to a broad hydrobiological audience, and collections of papers in special issues covering focused topics.
Stephen Russell Carpenter is an American lake ecologist who focuses on lake eutrophication which is the over-enrichment of lake ecosystems leading to toxic blooms of micro-organisms and fish kills.
John P. Smol, is a Canadian ecologist, limnologist and paleolimnologist who is a Distinguished University Professor in the Department of Biology at Queen's University, Kingston, Ontario, where he also held the Canada Research Chair in Environmental Change for the maximum of three 7-year terms (2001–2021). He founded and co-directs the Paleoecological Environmental Assessment and Research Lab (PEARL).
The Institute of Ecosystem Study was one of the institutes of the Italian National Research Council (CNR) from 2002 to 2018.
Kenneth H. Mann received the first Lifetime Achievement Award of the American Society of Limnology and Oceanography in 1994.
Cinzia Verde is an Italian researcher in marine biochemistry at the National Research Council (CNR), Institute of Biosciences and BioResources (IBBR).
Trista Vick-Majors is an American Assistant Professor in Biological Sciences at Michigan Tech. She is an Antarctic biogeochemist and microbial ecologist, best known for her work showing that microorganisms are present under the Antarctic ice sheet.
Robert Henry Peters was a Canadian ecologist and limnologist that championed a predictive approach to science in order to make quantitative models relevant to public needs. He proposed that predictive limnology could be an effective tool for producing empirical models about relevant processes and organisms in lakes. He was a Professor in the Biology Department of McGill University, Montreal, Canada from 1974 to his death in 1996.
Maciej Gliwicz was a Polish biologist, evolutionist and professor at the University of Warsaw who specialised in the field of hydrobiology.
James Elser is an American ecologist and limnologist. He is Director & Bierman Professor of Ecology, Flathead Lake Biological Station, University of Montana and research professor, School of Life Sciences, Arizona State University. He is known for his work in ecological stoichiometry. In 2019, he was elected to the National Academy of Sciences.
Cesarina Monti, better known as Rina Monti and, sometimes, as Rina Monti Stella, was an Italian scientist. A biologist, physiologist, limnologist and zoologist, in 1907 she became the first woman to obtain a university chair in the Kingdom of Italy.
Robert George Wetzel was an American limnologist and ecologist, a specialist in freshwater ecology, chemistry, and environmental protection. Wetzel served as the general secretary and treasurer of the International Association of Theoretical and Applied Limnology for 37 years in addition to his tenure as president of the American Society of Limnology and Oceanography (1980-1981).
The Journal of Limnology is a triannual peer-reviewed open access scientific journal covering all aspects of limnology, including the ecology, biology, microbiology, geology, physics, and chemistry of freshwater habitats, as well as the impact of human activities and the management and conservation of inland aquatic ecosystems. It was established in 1942 as the Memorie dell'Istituto Italiano di Idrobiologia by the Water Research Institute (Verbania) of which it is still the official journal, obtaining its current title in 1999.