Département Ecologie aquatique

Ecologie aquatique

Le département d'écologie aquatique de l'Eawag se compose de huit groupes de recherche et englobe une multitude de disciplines différentes de l'écologie et de la biologie de l'évolution, couvrant toute la gamme du niveau individuel aux écosystèmes en passant par les associations. En savoir plus

Actualités du département

Les effets indirects font avancer l'évolution

Martin Schäfer prélève un échantillon d'eau dans l'un des étangs expérimentaux (photo : Christoph Walcher, Eawag).
28 août 2025 –

Une étude internationale menée dans les étangs expérimentaux de l'Eawag démontre l'impact des effets écologiques indirects sur l'évolution des espèces.

Une étude internationale menée dans les étangs expérimentaux de l'Eawag démontre l'impact des effets écologiques indirects sur l'évolution des espèces.
En savoir plus

Entre turbines et torrents, en quête d’un débit résiduel optimal

2 juillet 2025 –

L'hydroélectricité ne laisse souvent qu'un mince filet d'eau à la nature. Un rapport récent fait le point.

L'hydroélectricité ne laisse souvent qu'un mince filet d'eau à la nature. Un rapport récent fait le point.
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Gagner du temps dans la lutte contre la moule quagga

Pour chaque lac, chaque année où la moule quagga n’est pas détectée est une année de gagnée (Photo: Keystone, Gaetan Bally).
8 avril 2025 –

Pour limiter la propagation de cette espèce invasive qu’est la moule quagga, les chercheuses et chercheurs de l’Eawag recommandent d’agir rapidement en misant sur la prévention à grande échelle, la détection précoce et...

Pour limiter la propagation de cette espèce invasive qu’est la moule quagga, les chercheuses et chercheurs de l’Eawag recommandent d’agir rapidement en misant sur la prévention à grande échelle, la détection précoce et l’endiguement.
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Participez à nos événements

29.09.​2025,
9h00
Eawag Dübendorf
Wiedervernässung von Waldflächen

PEAK-Basiskurs B35/25

21. - 22.10.​2025,
9h00
Vogelwarte Sempach
Contrôle des effets des revitalisations de cours d’eau - avifaune

Cours d’approfondissement PEAK V61/25

SNSF Starting Grants et Ambizione Fellowships

Informations pour les parties intéressées (anglais)

Aquascope

Imagerie sous-marine en temps réel

Projets de recherche

Investigation of the Resilience and Adaptability of Quagga Mussels

Epigenomics of rapid adaptation in invasive Quagga mussels
Un programme de recherche en plusieurs phases de l'Eawag et de l'Office fédéral suisse de l'environnement (OFEV)

Changement climatique et biodiversité aquatique
Der Rückgang der biologischen Vielfalt ist neben dem Klimawandel eines der drängendsten Umweltprobleme der heutigen Zeit. Das Synthesezentrum Biodiversität bündelt Erkenntnisse und macht sie allgemein verfügbar.

Translational Centre Biodiversity Conservation (TCBC)
Die Architektur von Artgemeinschaften und trophischen Netzwerke in blau-grünen Ökosystemen

Architektur von blau-grünen Gemeinschaften
Dieses Projekt leistet einen Beitrag zur Blue Green Biodiversity Research Initiative - einer Eawag-WSL-Kollaboration, die sich auf die Biodiversität an der Schnittstelle von aquatischen und terrestrischen Ökosystemen konzentriert.

Warming-related community turnover in terrestrial and freshwater ecosystems
Warum blühen giftige Cyanbakterien? ...

Cyano Bloom
Understanding and measuring how flow intermittency drives biodiversity and river functions in an alpine environment

Alpine Streams and Flow Intermittency
La collaboration entre l’Eawag et le WSL a pour objectif d’effectuer des recherches sur la biodiversité à l’interface des écosystèmes aquatiques et terrestres.

Initiative de recherche Blue-Green Biodiversity

Autres projets de recherche

Dernières publications

Freeman, E. C., Emilson, E. J. S., Webster, K. L., Dittmar, T., & Tanentzap, A. J. (2025). Logging disrupts the ecology of molecules in headwater streams. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America PNAS, 122(35), e2409104122 (10 pp.). doi:10.1073/pnas.2409104122, Institutional Repository

Global demand for wood products is increasing forest harvest. One understudied consequence of logging is that it accelerates mobilization of dissolved organic matter (DOM) from soils to aquatic ecosystems where it is more easily rereleased to the atmosphere. Here, we tested how logging changed DOM in headwaters of hardwood-dominated catchments in northern Ontario, Canada. We applied a before-after-control-impact experiment across four catchments for 3 y and measured DOM monthly during ice-free seasons. DOM concentration in streams from logged catchments quadrupled, on average, only for the first 2 mo postharvest, but resulting changes to the molecular composition of DOM persisted for at least 2 y. Ultrahigh-resolution mass spectrometry revealed that DOM composition within logged streams became more available for microbial use and chemically diverse than in controls, with novel highly unsaturated polyphenols, carboxylic-rich alicyclic, and nitrogen-containing formulae. The molecular composition of stream DOM measured fortnightly postharvest was most similar to the DOM composition of surrounding soils, likely due to increased hydrological connectivity. Alongside carbon being more likely to be released into the atmosphere, we estimate that selective logging increased the total flux of dissolved organic carbon in streams by 6.4% of the carbon extracted as timber. Although these estimates are short-lived, they should affect the millions of hectares that are logged annually. Carbon accounting of forestry, including as a natural climate solution, must now consider the transport and fate of DOM from land into water.
Couton, M., Knüsel, M., Locher, N., Alther, R., & Altermatt, F. (2025). The importance of karstic aquifers for the past and future survival of groundwater amphipods. Diversity and Distributions, 31(9), e70063 (14 pp.). doi:10.1111/ddi.70063, Institutional Repository

Aim: Genetic diversity is key to the long-term maintenance and adaptability of species to changing environments. While for above-ground ecosystems, the monitoring and understanding of genetic diversity has advanced substantially, some less accessible ecosystems and their organisms have been largely overseen. This is particularly the case for groundwater organisms. It is not only difficult to collect sufficient genetic data to identify spatial patterns but they may also have been experiencing very different drivers to population size, occurrence, and genetic structure due to very limited dispersal capacity and persistence in areas extending glacial cycles.
Location: Switzerland.
Methods: Here, we use a unique and spatially highly resolved data set containing a representative collection of thousands of Niphargus amphipod individuals across Switzerland. We analysed the genetic structure of ~1300 individuals of five species within their contemporary distribution.
Results: We found a significantly higher diversity in karstic aquifers and a correlation between the genetic diversity of a species and the proportion of its distribution in the karst.
Main Conclusions: This identifies karstic ecosystems as specific targets for future conservation programmes but also indicates that these karstic areas could have been possible refugia of Pleistocene persistence. Being epicentres of genetic diversity, the protection of the karst is also central for the maintenance of groundwater organisms' adaptive potential to future climatic changes.
Schäfer, M., Malacrinò, A., Walcher, C., Spaak, P., Serwaty-Sárazová, M., Käser, S., … Xu, S. (2025). Aphid herbivory on macrophytes drives adaptive evolution in an aquatic community via indirect effects. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America PNAS, 122(34), e2502742122 (8 pp.). doi:10.1073/pnas.2502742122, Institutional Repository

Indirect ecological interactions—where one species influences another via changes to a third species or the environment—are ubiquitous in natural communities but are rarely linked directly to rapid evolutionary change. Using large outdoor mesocosms, we show that terrestrial aphid herbivory on macrophytes (duckweed) cascades through species interaction networks to alter phytoplankton abundance and water chemistry, driving rapid adaptive evolution of the planktonic crustacean Daphnia magna. The aphid-herbivory-mediated changes in the aquatic community then benefited the aphids by enhancing their performance on duckweed. Our findings provide direct evidence that indirect ecological interactions in near-natural communities can drive rapid evolutionary changes and mediate ecoevolutionary interactions between seemingly independent organisms.

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