Virtual Research Environments and Essential Variables: join LifeWatch ERIC at EGU 2026

EGU 2026

The General Assembly of the European GeoSciences Union (EGU) takes place in Vienna from 3 to 8 May 2026: one of the biggest conferences on environmental and earth sciences.

Every year, the event brings together around 20,000 geoscientists from all over the world, covering all disciplines of the Earth, planetary, and space sciences. The EGU aims to provide a forum where scientists, especially early career researchers, can present their work and discuss their ideas with experts in all fields of geoscience.

LifeWatch ERIC is taking an active part in this year’s conference, participating in one session, and co-organising another session and a training:

  • The first session, “Co-creating Climate Services: Linking Essential Variables with Actionable Decision Support“, is organised by the ENVRI-Hub Next project, where LifeWatch ERIC is involved in different areas, including training. The session is inspired by the current work in the project, where Essential Variables (EVs) play a key role. It will explore the technical, infrastructural, and policy advancements required to make EVs the foundational language for global environmental cooperation. The session conveners and co-conveners invited scientists, data engineers, social scientists, and policymakers to connect the “essential” with the “actionable”, forging a coherent path from global observation to local solution: https://www.egu26.eu/session/57662
  • Within the context of ENVRI-Hub NEXT, LifeWatch ERIC is also organising a training session (https://www.egu26.eu/session/56062) with trainers Kety Giuliacci , representing INGV and EPOS, and with Zhiming Zhao (Uva/LifeWatch ERIC) and Eleonora Parisi from LifeWatch ERIC. The training, in the form of a short course, will consist in live demonstrations, guided practice, and discussions on how to harness the ENVRI-Hub for interdisciplinary research. You can join the session on 7 May, from 08:30 to 10:15 CEST in Room 2-82, and express your interest through the following form: https://forms.gle/84mPeEDQ53ZbveRQA
  • The second session is titled “Bridging Earth Science Research through Integrated e-Infrastructures and Virtual Research Environments (VREs): From Digital Services to Digital Twins“. Co-convened by Jacco Konijn (LifeWatch ERIC VLIC), it focuses on Virtual Research Environments in Earth and Environmental science, which are at the heart of LifeWatch ERIC services. This session aims to highlight how interoperable e-Infrastructure services can be used to build VREs and Virtual Labs to provide end-to-end support, strengthening research capacity through collaboration between service providers and scientists.
  • Contributions selected for this session will demonstrate practical examples of how digital services, VREs and e-infrastructures enhance research workflows in Earth and environmental science, present innovative integration approaches, highlight technical implementations, and share lessons learnt and new challenges: https://www.egu26.eu/session/56062
  • Members of LifeWatch ERIC’s VLIC will also present in this session the poster “A Maturity Model for Facilitating Virtual Lab’s Co-Development“, proposing a Virtual Lab Maturity Model that facilitates a common language across disciplines and ensures alignment with FAIR principles.

For more information on EGU 2026 visit the official event page: https://www.egu26.eu

Community engagement and application integration

  • March–June 2026​
    • stakeholder mapping and engagement strategy;
    • first open webinar.
  • July 2026–December 2027​
    • workshops, training activities, and industry–academia roundtables;
    • co-development of application-oriented pilot studies.
  • 2028​
    • consolidation of collaborations, cross-infrastructure initiatives, and dissemination of impact- oriented outputs.

Fund raising

  • End of January 2025 – Establishing a WG Committee on scouting project application opportunities and fundraising.
Greece

The Greek National Distributed Centre is funded by the Greek General Secretariat of Research and Technology and is coordinated by the Institute of Marine Biology, Biotechnology and Aquaculture of the Hellenic Centre for Marine Research, in conjunction with 47 associated partner institutions.

To know more about how Greece contributes to LifeWatch ERIC, please visit our dedicated webpage.

Visit Greece webpage
Italy

The Italian National Distributed Centre is led and managed by the Italian National Research Council (CNR) and is coordinated by a Joint Research Unit, currently comprising 35 members. Moreover, Italy hosts one of the LifeWatch ERIC Common Facilities, the Service Centre.

To know more about how Italy contributes to LifeWatch ERIC, please visit our dedicated webpage.

Visit Italy webpage
Netherlands

The Dutch National Distributed Centre is hosted by the Faculty of Science of the University of Amsterdam. Moreover, The Netherlands hosts one of the LifeWatch ERIC Common Facilities, the Virtual Laboratory and Innovation Centre.

To know more about how The Netherlands contributes to LifeWatch ERIC, please visit our dedicated webpage.

Visit Netherlands webpage
Portugal

The Portuguese National Distributed Centre is managed by PORBIOTA, the Portuguese e-Infrastructure for Information and Research on Biodiversity. Led by BIOPOLIS/CIBIO-InBIO – Research Centre in Biodiversity and Genetic Resources, PORBIOTA connects the principal Portuguese research institutions working in biodiversity.

To know more about how Portugal contributes to LifeWatch ERIC, please visit our dedicated webpage.

Visit Portugal webpage
Slovenia

The Slovenian National Distributed Centre is led by the Research Centre of the Slovenian Academy of Sciences and Arts (ZRC SAZU). It focuses on the development of technological solutions in the field of biodiversity and socio-ecosystem research.

To know more about how Slovenia contributes to LifeWatch ERIC, please visit our dedicated webpage.

Visit Slovenia webpage
Spain

The Spanish National Distributed Centre is supported by the Ministry of Science, Innovation and Universities, the Regional Government of Andalusia and the Guadalquivir River Basin Authority (Ministry for Ecological Transition-MITECO). Moreover, Spain is the hosting Member State of LifeWatch ERIC, the location of its Statutory Seat & ICT e-Infrastructure Technical Office (LifeWatch ERIC Common Facilities). 

To know more about how Spain contributes to LifeWatch ERIC, please visit our dedicated webpage.

Visit Spain webpage
Bulgaria

The Bulgarian National Distributed Centre is represented by the  Agricultural University-Plovdiv.

To know more about how Bulgaria contributes to LifeWatch ERIC, please visit our dedicated webpage.

Visit Bulgaria webpage

Mapping user requirements

  • End of January 2025 – Catalogue of services already available in LifeWatch ERIC or research lines addressing ecological responses to climate change;
  • February 2025 (TBD) – Online working table on setting priorities, timeline and milestones for the mapping service and model requirements by scientists and science stakeholders.

Implementing services

  • End of January 2025 – Internal distribution of a questionnaire on the most used/relevant model resources in the WG member research activity;
  • February 2025 (TBD) – Online working table on setting priorities, timeline and milestones for the mapping service and model requirements by scientists and science stakeholders.

Organising WG workshops and conferences

  • End of January 2025 – Setting priority research lines and contributions to the BEeS 2025 LifeWatch Conference for the session on the “Ecological responses to climate change”;
  • March/April 2025 (TBD) – Workshop ‘Ecological modelling and eco-informatics to address functional responses of biodiversity and ecosystems to climate change’ co-organised with the University of Salento;
  • 30 June – 3 July 2025 – Participation to LifeWatch 2025 BEeS Conference on “Addressing the Triple Planetary Crisis”.

Meetings, Webinars, International Conferences & Networking (2025/2026)

  • Organising and participating at discussions on emerging technologies in biodiversity monitoring;
  • Organising webinars on machine learning, eDNA analysis, and automated data collection;
  • Fostering collaboration between researchers, technologists, and decision-makers.

Bioinformatics services and infrastructure

  • March–September 2026​
    • assessment of computational needs;
    • deployment of Virtual Machines and Galaxy Instances;
    • integration of workflows for eDNA, DNA metabarcoding, and shotgun metagenomics.
  • October 2026–June 2027​
    • release and optimization of reproducible workflows;
    • scaling of infrastructure;
    • integration of ML/AI tools for biodiversity analyses.

Collaborative Research & Case Studies (2025/2026)

  • Conducting pilot projects to test new monitoring methods;
  • Publishing scientific and popular science papers and reports on advancements in biodiversity assessment.

Data Standardisation & FAIR Principles Implementation (2025/2026)

  • Developing best practices for data curation and sharing;
  • Ensuring that biodiversity data aligns with FAIR (Findable, Accessible, Interoperable, Reusable) standards.

Development of VREs for Ecosystem Simulation (2026)

  • Creating virtual models of ecosystems to predict environmental changes;
  • Enhancing conservation strategies through AI-driven simulations.

Mapping Requirements and Gap Analysis

  • End of December 2025 – Catalogue of services already available in LifeWatch ERIC or research lines Ecosystem services mapping.

Methodological Alignment and Innovation

  • End of January 2026 – Online working table on mapping standards, classification systems, and indicators across members;
  • End of January 2026 – Catalogue of advanced techniques (e.g., remote sensing, GIS modelling, and machine learning) for scalable, habitat-based ecosystem service mapping;
  • End December 2026 – Methodological framework to support methodological innovation through joint development and testing of mapping approaches, especially linking ecosystem service supply and demand.

Knowledge Exchange and Capacity Building

  • End of December 2025 – Create a shared repository of guidance documents, tools, templates, and data resources accessible to WG members and broader communities.

Policy Relevance and Uptake

  • End of May 2026 – Policy-brief to demonstrate the application of habitat-based mapping in supporting EU strategies (e.g., Biodiversity Strategy, Nature Restoration Law).

Cross-Disciplinary Lexicon

  • End of April 2026 – Lexicon of standardised terminology
  • End of May 2026 – Publication submitted

Environmental Data Mapping

  • End of May 2026 – Core environmental data mapped as a list
  • End of June 2026 – Cross-comparison with existing LifeWatch catalogue done

Integrated Data-to-Model Workflows

  • End of December 2026 – At least 5 workflows for data-model integration developed and published
  • End of February 2027 – At least 5 workflows for policy-relevant outputs developed and published

Experimental design and extraction protocols

  • March–June 2026​
    • Kick-off meeting;
    • collection of use cases;
    • mapping of existing experimental designs and nucleic acid extraction protocols.
  • July–December 2026
    • Comparative evaluation of sampling strategies and sequencing approaches;
    • assessment of extraction methods across environmental matrices;
    • drafting of best-practice guidelines.
  • January–April 2027
    • Pilot validation, community feedback, and release of Version 1.0 standardised guidelines.
Belgium

The Belgian National Distributed Centre makes varied and complementary in-kind contributions to LifeWatch ERIC. These are implemented in the form of long-lasting projects by various research centres and universities distributed throughout the country and supported by each respective political authority.

To know more about how Belgium contributes to LifeWatch ERIC, please visit our dedicated webpage.

Visit Belgium webpage