Consortium > UNITUS

Universitá della Tuscia

Organization short name: UNITUS
acronym:
web page: www.unitus.it/

Description of the organization

The Department of Forest Environment and Resources of University of Tuscia (UNITUS/DISAFRI) is composed by 11 full time permanent scientists working in the field of forest research (biological processes and interactions from the scale of plants to the ecosystem and regional problems) with a focus on the structure and function of forest ecosystem in order to identify the most suitable mechanism for a forest sustainable management.

Expertise and experience of the organization

DISAFRI has considerable experience, at national and international level, in projects dealing with forestry, carbon, energy, and water cycling, ecosystem modelling, remote sensing, rehabilitation of degraded areas and land management. DISAFRI is also actively involved in national and international (IPCC) initiatives aiming to provide the scientific background for the implementation of the Rio conventions and the Kyoto protocol.

Selected reference projects

DISAFRI is involved in many Italian, European and international projects, as coordinator or full participant. As regards European carbon-related projects, DISAFRI has participated or is participating in:

Responsibilities in CARBO-Extreme

  • Long Term Carbon Measurements and Climate (WP3)
  • Data infrastructure and model support (WP4), (lead)

Key scientific / technical personnel

Prof. Riccardo Valentini, head of the Department of Forest Environment and Resources, expert in canopy processes, particularly eddy covariance measurements and modelling of CO2 and water fluxes, volatile organic compounds exchanges and biophysical and physiological studies on forest trees. He participates, as chairman, coordinator or scientific responsible in many international multilateral environmental agreements, European and international programs. He published more than 100 papers in scientific journals, including Science and Nature.
Dr. Dario Papale, scientist at the University of Tuscia, expert in eddy covariance data analysis and model data integration in particularly with data-oriented models for terrestrial carbon fluxes spatialization at regional and continental scales. He is scientific responsible of the ecosystem component database of the CarboeuropeIP project.
Dr. Luca Belelli is post-doc, his main activity is in the eddy covariance and ancillary data analysis.

Selected recent relevant publications

Belelli Marchesini L et al., Carbon balance assessment of a natural steppe of southern Siberia by multiple constraint approach. Biogeosciences, 4, 581-595, 2007. link to publisher

Moffat AM, Papale D, Reichstein M et al., Comprehensive comparison of gap-filling techniques for eddy covariance net carbon fluxes. Agricultural and Forest Meteorology, 147, 209-232, 2007. link to publisher

Papale D and Valentini R, A new assessment of European forests carbon exchanges by eddy fluxes and artificial neural network spatialization. Global Change Biology, 9, 525-535, 2003. link to publisher

Papale D et al., Towards a standardized processing of Net Ecosystem Exchange measured with eddy covariance technique: algorithms and uncertainty estimation. Biogeosciences, 3, 571-583, 2006. link to publisher

Reichstein M, Ciais P, Papale D et al., Reduction of ecosystem productivity and respiration during the European summer 2003 climate anomaly: a joint flux tower, remote sensing and modelling analysis. Global Change Biology, 2006, 1-18, 2006. link to publisher

Reichstein M, …, Papale D, … Valentini R, On the separation of net ecosystem exchange into assimilation and ecosystem respiration: review and improved algorithm. Global Change Biology, 11, 1424-1439, 2005. link to publisher

Valentini R et al., Respiration as the main determinant of European forests carbon balance. Nature, 404, 861-865, 2000. link to publisher

Valentini R, EUROFLUX: An Integrated Network for Studying the Long-Term Responses of Biospheric Exchanges of Carbon, Water and Energy of European Forests. Fluxes of Carbon, Water and Energy of European Forests, R Valentini, Ed., Springer Verlag, 297, 2003.