BIORESET

Pollution is threatening the biodiversity of inland waters that are vital to society and the future of the Earth. A major source of this pollution are effluent discharges from wastewater treatment plants. The treatment processes used in these plants do not efficiently remove emerging contaminants, such as pharmaceuticals and microplastics, which lead to health hazards to non-target species, including humans. This polluting source limits the conservation and restoration of freshwater systems. At the same time, there is a need for strategies to up-scale restoration solutions and for rapid and simple to use methodologies to assess conservation and restoration progress; i.e. assessment strategies anticipating the success of conservation/remediation measures in suitable timescales, ensuring reliable data comparison over time and space, and guiding intervention measures. BioReset will promote ecosystem recovery and conservation through a combined approach including: cutting-edge advances in existing wastewater treatment processes and developing methodologies to assess ecosystem conservation and restoration provided by these treatments based on investigating diatom communities, laying the foundation for a global quality index for ecological status and ecosystem assessment.