MSCA Hydro-ALPS

Across central Europe, the Alps cover four sub-climatic regions and play a major role in the continent's water storage and supply. Famously referred to as the "water tower of Europe", the Alps host the majority of the sources of major rivers such as the Danube, Rhine, Po and Rhone. Although strongly influenced by human activities, water resources on the continent are also based on the hydro-climatic variability affecting the water cycle on a Euro-Mediterranean scale.

The Hydro-ALPS project aims to provide long-term records of hydrological change and associated erosion for the pre-instrumental period. The project will use oxygen and silicon isotopes of diatoms extracted from lake sediments as tracers of hydrological conditions and chemical alteration of the crystalline basement. The study will focus on the southern part of the Alps in the Mediterranean basin, which is one of the regions of the world expected to be most affected by climate change. The new records will increase the 'window' of observation of climate change beyond the last few hundred years to help validate regional climate models.