PROJECT .
RESEARCHER
RESEARCHER
PhD student
The "Bio-monitoring" project, which is part of the Foundation's area dedicated to research on climate change, pollution and anthropogenic impact , aims to investigate the effect of these aspects on the behaviour of animals and their health state; in particular, the project intends to use some animal species present within the ZOOM Biopark as bioindicators.
There are numerous threats that increasingly endanger natural resources and contribute to the destruction of the ecosystems and biodiversity of the planet: pollution of the various environmental compartments, climate change, but also pathogens, the use of pesticides, 'increased urbanization, noise pollution, and the invasion of alien species.
Several studies (e.g., Ryan et al, 2018) have shown that different animal matrices, such as feathers, feces and eggs, are an efficient method for environmental biomonitoring and are excellent bioindicators for assessing the level of alteration in the state of health of the specimen. In particular, birds will be the most investigated species, since their feathers in particular are able to accumulate, over time, different types of pollutants, thus providing a historical "record" of the exposure. (Burger, 1993 - Abbasi et al., 2015).
Furthermore, different species accumulate pollutants in different ways (Rutkowskaa et al, 2018) according to their characteristics.
The species present in zoological parks can be excellent bioindicators for collecting data in different geographical areas: the use of the same species, the same sampling and analysis methods, could allow a comparison of the health status of the different regions and lead to the creation of an international study network .
"Bio-monitoring" activated by the Zoom Foundation. Using some selected species of the biopark as bioindicators, we will be able to search for data that can provide information on the different types of pollution that impact the animal species of the biopark;
to use non-invasive methods of investigation, through the collection and analysis of different animal matrices, as a substrate to evaluate the impact of contaminants in food and the environment, on the health and behaviour of animals.
PERFORMED ACTIVITIES.
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PhD scholarship activation in Sustainable Development and Cooperation (SUSTNET)
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Study of the areas of the park to obtain a 360° monitoring (water-air-soil-vegetable and animal matrices)
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Portable voltammetric test
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Analysis of honey samples to determine the concentrations of various emerging contaminants, heavy metals and microplastics
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First data collected in collaboration with the University of Antanarivo in Madagascar for joint research with the ZOOM Foundation on the analyzes carried out on the island of Lemurs and on the relationship between the concentrations of pollutants found in the different types of samples taken under review in Zoom and in Madagsacar.
NEXT STEPS.
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Development of methods of analysis in the field in order to create biomonitoring models and which use animal and vegetable matrices as bio-indicators and to evaluate the welfare state of the animals in question.
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Characterization of animal and environmental matrices
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Environmental quality and emerging contaminants (monitoring and removal)
PARTNER.
