Publications related to River Networks as Ecological Corridors: a Complex Systems Perspective for Integrating Hydrologic, Geomorphological and Ecologic Dynamics

At what spatial scale does natural selection operate? Using multiscale frameworks to calibrate the effects of environmental factors across landscape continuums

Patterns in nature arise from processes interacting across a continuum of spatial scales, where new relationships emerge at each level of investigation. These patterns are nested features encompassing fine-scale local patterns, such as topography and geolo ...

EPFL2024

Spatiotemporal Dynamics of Flow and Hydrochemistry in Drainage Networks

Izabela Bujak-Ozga

Despite their high ecological value, non-perennial streams have received less attention than their perennial counterparts. This doctoral thesis addresses this disparity by advancing knowledge on the dynamics of the drainage density and hydrologic processes ...

EPFL2024

The microbial genomics of glacier-fed streams: adaptations to an extreme ecosystem

Massimo Bourquin

Glacier-fed streams are the cold, ultra-oligotrophic, and unstable streams that are fed by glacial meltwater. Despite these extreme conditions, they harbour a diverse and abundant microbial diversity that develops into biofilms, covering the boulders and s ...

EPFL2024

The cost of adaptability: resource availability constrains functional stability under pulsed disturbances

Hannes Markus Peter

Global change exposes ecosystems to changes in the frequency, magnitude, and concomitancy of disturbances, which impact the composition and functioning of these systems. Here, we experimentally evaluate the effects of salinity disturbances and eutrophicati ...

Amer Soc Microbiology2024

Excited State-Specific CASSCF Theory for the Torsion of Ethylene

State-specific complete active space self-consistent field (SS-CASSCF) theory has emerged as a promising route to accurately predict electronically excited energy surfaces away from molecular equilibria. However, its accuracy and practicality for chemical ...

Amer Chemical Soc2024

Seeking the new, learning from the unexpected: Computational models of surprise and novelty in the brain

Alireza Modirshanechi

Human babies have a natural desire to interact with new toys and objects, through which they learn how the world around them works, e.g., that glass shatters when dropped, but a rubber ball does not. When their predictions are proven incorrect, such as whe ...

EPFL2024

Lotic-SIPCO2: Adaptation of an open-source CO2 sensor system and examination of associated emission uncertainties across a range of stream sizes and land uses

Andrew Lean Robison

River networks play a crucial role in the global carbon cycle, as relevant sources of carbon dioxide (CO2) to the atmosphere. Advancements in high-frequency monitoring in aquatic environments have enabled measurement of dissolved CO2 concentration at tempo ...

Association for the Sciences of Limnology and Oceanography (ASLO)2024

Mapping drivers of tropical forest loss with satellite image time series and machine learning

Devis Tuia, Jan Pisl, Marc Conrad Russwurm, Lloyd Haydn Hughes, Gaston Jean Lenczner, Jan Dirk Wegner

The rates of tropical deforestation remain high, resulting in carbon emissions, biodiversity loss, and impacts on local communities. To design effective policies to tackle this, it is necessary to know what the drivers behind deforestation are. Since drive ...

Iop Publishing Ltd2024

Organ-specific biotransformation in salmonids: Insight into intrinsic enzyme activity and biotransformation of three micropollutants

Kristin Schirmer, Juliane Hollender

Aquatic ecosystems continue to be threatened by chemical pollution. To what extent organisms are able to cope with chemical exposure depends on their ability to display mechanisms of defense across different organs. Among these mechanisms, biotransformatio ...

Elsevier2024

Optimality principles for the analysis of biological processes across scales: From enzyme kinetics to microbiome dynamics

Asli Sahin

Microorganisms are essential for life on Earth, performing key roles in numerous biological processes. Their influence extends across a wide spectrum, from human health and ecological balance to advancements in biotechnology and industrial applications. Th ...

EPFL2024

Use of an unmanned aerial-aquatic vehicle for acoustic sensing in freshwater ecosystems

Mirko Kovac, Raphael Zufferey

Freshwater ecosystems are endangered, underfunded and understudied, making new methods such as passive acoustic monitoring (PAM) essential for improving the efficiency and effectiveness of data collection. However, many challenges are still to be addressed ...

Wiley2023

Addressing chemical pollution in biodiversity research

Kristin Schirmer, Colette vom Berg, Ahmed Tlili

Climate change, biodiversity loss, and chemical pollution are planetary-scale emergencies requiring urgent mitigation actions. As these "triple crises" are deeply interlinked, they need to be tackled in an integrative manner. However, while climate change ...

WILEY2023

Scattering from Time-Modulated Transmission-Line Loads: Theory and Experiments in Acoustics

Romain Christophe Rémy Fleury, Matthieu Francis Malléjac

Scattering wave systems that are periodically modulated in time offer many new degrees of freedom to control waves in both the spatial and frequency domains. Such systems, albeit linear, do not conserve frequency and require the adaptation of the usual the ...

American Physical Society (APS)2023

Atlas Narratives of Anthropogenic Transformations across the Vietnamese Mekong Delta's Urban-Rural Territories: Water Ecosystems as Subject for the Social Ecological Transition

Sylvie Tram Nguyen

Well beyond the impact of climate change, anthropogenic modifications of the Vietnam Mekong Delta's ecosystems have resulted in environmental degradation and subsequent loss in ecosystems. The environmental impacts include but are not limited to accelerate ...

EPFL2023

Identifying genetic and dietary modulators of metabolic disorders using systems genetics

Xiaoxu Li

Long-term consumption of lipid-rich foods can contribute to common metabolic diseases and systemic low-grade inflammation. However, dietary responses and the development of non-communicable diseases are shaped by genetic factors and gene-by-environment int ...

EPFL2023

Assessing the readiness of municipalities for digital process innovation

Mert Duygan

Pre-adoption phases of innovation are understudied in the innovation literature. This article addresses preadoption phases of innovation by running a prospective analysis. We assess the readiness of municipalities for the adoption of a digital tool that br ...

ELSEVIER SCI LTD2023

Bayes Security: A Not So Average Metric

Carmela González Troncoso, Giovanni Cherubin

Security system designers favor worst-case security metrics, such as those derived from differential privacy (DP), due to the strong guarantees they provide. On the downside, these guarantees result in a high penalty on the system's performance. In this pa ...

IEEE2023

Glacier-Fed Stream Biofilms Harbor Diverse Resistomes and Biosynthetic Gene Clusters

Leïla Ezzat, Vincent Henri De Staercke, Tom Ian Battin, Paraskevi Pramateftaki, Hannes Markus Peter, Matteo Tolosano, Michail Styllas, Tyler Joe Kohler, Stylianos Fodelianakis, Massimo Bourquin, Susheel Bhanu Busi, Grégoire Marie Octave Edouard Michoud

Antimicrobial resistance is an omnipresent phenomenon in the anthropogenically influenced ecosystems. However, its role in shaping microbial community dynamics in pristine environments is relatively unknown. ...

AMER SOC MICROBIOLOGY2023

Nonlocally-resonant metamaterials

Aleksi Antoine Bossart

In this thesis, we unveil a third design path to manipulate elastic waves within architected media, distinct from the traditional phononic crystal and locally-resonant metamaterial concepts. The core innovation lies in the concept of nonlocal resonances, d ...

EPFL2023

Food web structure and energy flux dynamics, but not taxonomic richness, influence microbial ecosystem functions in a Sphagnum-dominated peatland

Alexandre Buttler, Edward Mitchell, Vincent Eric Jules Jassey

Soil microbial communities are vital for multiple ecosystem processes and services. In particular, soil microbial food webs are key determinants of soil biodiversity, functioning and stability. Unclear, however, is how struc-tural features of food webs, su ...

ELSEVIER FRANCE-EDITIONS SCIENTIFIQUES MEDICALES ELSEVIER2023