LifeWatch ERIC’s participation in the Smart Agrifood Summit, Europe’s largest agrifood innovation and digitisation event, marked this year a cornerstone for the Infrastructure's involvement in agroecology initiatives. On Friday 30 September, LifeWatch ERIC CTO, Juan Miguel González-Aranda, alongside José Emilio Guerrero (professor at the University of Cordoba, member of Common Agricultural Policy Ministerial Advisory Committee, and LifeWatch ERIC collaborator) were delighted to welcome the Spanish Minister for Agriculture, Fisheries and Food, Luis Planas, to the Infrastructure's booth. A fruitful meeting focusing on the contribution that LifeWatch ERIC makes to the agroecology sector, during which the Minister appreciated how LifeWatch ERIC’s projects...

As with every year, LifeWatch ERIC is taking part in the annual Smart Agrifood Summit, Europe's largest agrifood innovation and digitisation event, which is taking place this year from 29 – 30 September in Malaga, Spain. Attended by 3000 participants, 300 speakers, 200 start-ups and with over 50 countries represented, LifeWatch ERIC is in the perfect place to find and consolidate synergies; dozens of corporations, companies and entities highly involved in agrifood innovation and sustainability, such as Cajamar ADNAgroFood, held productive meetings with the infrastructure at its stand. Notably at the event, Juan Miguel González-Aranda, LifeWatch ERIC Chief Technology Officer, presented "SmartfoodLifeWatch",...

The UNGA77 Science Summit (SSUNGA77) is taking place from 13–30 September 2022 in New York and online, organised and moderated by ISC Intelligence in Science (advisory firm specialised in science, technology and policy). Following the successful Biodiversity Plenary which was hosted by LifeWatch ERIC and GBIF last Friday 16 September, LifeWatch ERIC CTO, Juan Miguel González-Aranda, was invited to participate yesterday, Tuesday 27 September, in an important SSUNGA77 session dedicated to Green Medicines: Plant Molecular Farming and a New Collaboration Model for Addressing Global Health Challenges. Dr González-Aranda gave his presentation during the Moderated Panel Discussion: Policy Framework for Stimulating Cooperative Capacity Building for Better Access to Medicines and Vaccines, entitled LifeWatch ERIC: e-Science Research Collaborationon e-Biodiversity &...

The Biodiversity Plenary at the Science Summit held to coincide with the 77th United Nations General Assembly (UNGA77) was convened by LifeWatch ERIC and GBIF (the Global Biodiversity Information Facility) on Friday 16 September. The event brought together representatives from governments, research infrastructures and data repositories, with demonstrations of collaborative research systems and examples of innovative digital technologies to facilitate the society to meet the challenge set by the SDGs to preserve ecosystems, through better informed decision-making that is firmly rooted in science.  With the support of the European Commission (European Regional Development Fund) and the Government of Andalusia, Spain, and organised and moderated by ISC Intelligence in Science (advisory firm specialised in science, technology and policy), the...

Next month, LifeWatch Italy and DiSTeBA (the ecology laboratory of the University of Salento) will be taking part in the 31st Conference of the Sea (XXXI Rassegna del mare) organised by Mareamico, an environmental protection and ecological agency. Together, they will be putting on an educational session for students aged 11–14, coordinated by Franca Sangiorgio of the LifeWatch Italy node. The Conference will take place in Gallipoli in the province of Lecce in southern Italy, and this year will revolve around the theme of ‘Safeguarding Biological Resources and the Blue Economy’. In order to increase their awareness and understanding of sustainability issues, the students...

ECSA59 was the first face-to-face meeting of the Estuarine and Coastal Sciences Association in three years and attracted 460 participants to the Kursaal Conference Centre in Donostia-San Sebastián, Spain from 5–8 September 2022. Under the theme of 'Using the best scientific knowledge for the sustainable management of estuaries and coastal seas', scientists from all over the world discussed urbanisation, remote sensing, social ecology, governance, resilience to global warming, modelling food webs and much, much more. Professor Angel Borja of the Basque Research and Technology Alliance (AZTI) as Conference Chair noted in his opening address how much things have changed in...

There’s been a lot going on at LifeWatch Belgium over summer 2022, so please flick through some of our favourite news stories from the LifeWatch Belgium website, where you can find the full versions of these featured articles. Taxonomy and beyond: ecological trait information in Aphia and WoRMS In 2018, the WoRMS Steering Committee identified “documenting relevant species traits” as one of the content priorities for WoRMS (hosted by the national focal point for LifeWatch Belgium, VLIZ). The relevance of traits and their integration with the taxonomy of WoRMS however already dates back to 2015, when Costello et al., 2015 prioritised 10 marine species traits to document:...

The Institute of Marine Biology, Biotechnology and Aquaculture at the Hellenic Centre for Marine Research –coordinator of the LifeWatch Greece node– has launched a new citizen science platform for the Horizon2020 project, Nautilos. Using the software Zooniverse, they have called their platform for Nautilos Marine Creatures, at the service of citizen scientists everywhere. The aim of the project is to help identify the sessile and often unnoticed benthic communities living on hard substrates using high-definition underwater images from artificial reefs, ports and natural sea caves. Morphological characters can be used to identify the taxonomic groups of these sophisticated marine communities. If you...

LifeWatch ERIC is pleased to announce that it is involved as a partner in a new, EU-funded research project called MarineSABRES. The project aims to address the continued and accelerated biodiversity loss caused by the intensification of human activities at land and sea. The project — coordinated by MaREI, the SFI Centre for Energy, Climate, and Marine Research at University College Cork — will bring together an international consortium of 22 partners across 11 countries and will receive €9.8m in funding from Horizon Europe, the EU’s key funding programme for research and innovation. Running for four years, MarineSABRES aims to...

On 1 September, alongside 37 other participants, LifeWatch ERIC took part in the Data Interoperability and Harmonisation workshop organised by Biodiversa+, with a presentation from LifeWatch ERIC Web Portal Officer, Lucia Vaira. During her presentation, she gave an overview of the EOSC Interoperability Framework in technical, semantic, organisational and legal terms, explaining the (Meta)data structure and workflows within LifeWatch ERIC, along with the status and main challenges of interoperability within the Infrastructure. Biodiversa+ is the European Biodiversity Partnership supporting excellent research on biodiversity with an impact for society and policy. It was jointly developed by BiodivERsA and the European Commission as part of...

WATCH THE LIVESTREAM On Friday 16 September, LifeWatch ERIC and GBIF, the Global Biodiversity Information Facility, will organise a Biodiversity Plenary at the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) Science Summit in New York, which is taking place from 13 – 30 September to mark the 77th General Assembly of the UN. Together, they will present collaborative research systems and examples of innovative digital technologies to meet the challenge set by the SDGs to preserve ecosystems –specifically SDG 14 Life below Water and SDG 15 Life on Land– encouraging better informed decision-making that is firmly rooted in science. Their complementary experiences will be offered both to the national delegations in the General Assembly and to the international...

Andalusia, the region home to the LifeWatch ERIC Statutory Seat and ICT-Core, drives the innovative Smartfood Project in the agricultural and fishing sectors. SmartFood is led by the Andalusia Agency for Agriculture and Fisheries Development (AGAPA), which is part of the Junta de Andalucía, and its aim is to better understand the impact of agriculture on the region’s biodiversity. On Monday 18 July, in Cordoba, a project event was held in which a balloon sensor probe was thrown, attended by LifeWatch ERIC CEO, Christos Arvanitidis, CTO, Juan Miguel González-Aranda, Project Coordinator, Rocío Moreno Domínguez, Direction Secretary and QARM/FitSM Technical Assistant, María Luz Vázquez Santana, and Satellite & HAPS Operations Manager...

This week, LifeWatch ERIC personnel Juan Miguel González-Aranda (CTO), Maria Luz Vázquez (Direction Secretary & QARM - FiTSM Technical Assistant for ICT-Core), Rocío Moreno (Project Executive Coordinator) and Cristina Huertas Olivares (International Initiatives & Projects Manager) are in Montevideo, Uruguay, for the second General Assembly of ResInfra EU-LAC. The ResInfra EU-LAC project pursues the construction of bi-regional collaboration between European Union and the LAC countries (Latin America and the Caribbean), and the meeting has gathered representatives from Uruguay and the European Commission as well as partners of the EU-LAC ResInfra Consortium to discuss items such as the project Sustainability Plan, the benefits of Research Infrastructure cooperation, and the next Horizon Europe INFRA work programme. On 20 July, LifeWatch ERIC CTO Juan Miguel González-Aranda gave...

In May this year, LifeWatch Italy was invited to join the COST Action CA20125 - Applications For Zoosporic Parasites In Aquatic Systems – ParAqua. The main aims of this project are to organise and coordinate an innovative and dynamic network of academia researchers, industries, and water management authorities to advance and apply knowledge and expertise on zoosporic parasites (i.e. aquatic fungi and fungi-like microorganisms) and the relation with their hosts in natural ecosystems and industrial algal biotech production.  Among the ParAqua objectives, specific task of WG1 and WG2 is to compile and integrate a database on zoosporic parasites across Europe...

The ALL-Ready Pilot Network Meeting took place on 4-6 July 2022 in Ghent, including a Demonstration Day in Hansbeke. The meeting gathered the members of the Pilot Network and the consortium partners, in person and remotely. The meeting included an interesting discussion about how to operationalise the thematic working groups during the project and a learning roundtable about best practices for co-creation, involving stakeholders. On the second day, a workshop was organised for Work Packages 4, 5 and 6 to discuss 1) Why a European Network of Agroecology Living Labs and Research Infrastructure is important, 2) What competencies and skills a European Network can improve, and 3)...