Abstract Project: KOP175

Burkhard Becker (Univ.Cologne)

TERBENMICOM is a follow up study of the STRUFUMICOM project at AWIPEV arctic base, which started with field work in the summer of 2022. The aim of the previous project was to evaluate biodiversity, function and biotic interactions in biocrusts on tundra soils and benthic diatom communities, as well as their responses to climate change scenarios. Of particular interest were adaptions of the communities to the extreme Arctic environment and the effect of the currently observed Arctic greening. In 2022 we sampled biocrusts benthic soil cores in different local areas: Ossian Sarsfjellet, Blomstrandhavoya and North-East of Ny-Ålesund. Metabarcoding, Metagenome and Metatranscriptome analyses have started and will yield plenty of new results until the end of the year. In addition, algal and chytridiomycetes have been or will be isolated for further analyses in laboratory experiments. In the new project we want to extend the study adding more sampling sites, e.g we miss a low altitude site on Ossian and we would like to add a site with exposure to South West. In addition, we want to investigate the seasonal effect on the soil crusts (sampling in beginning of July and end of August) and perform field measurements of photosynthetic activity at the different sites at different times of the year.