Mountain lakes are naturally transparent and exposed to intensive solar radiation, and therefore especially sensitive to environmental changes. Fluctuations in organic matter entering the lakes or produced in them under climate changes may significantly alter solar radiation attenuation, biogeochemical cycles, and lake productivity and fundamentally hamper water quality and ecosystem services they provide. The current research focuses on natural fluctuations and associations of UV radiation and light-attenuating dissolved organic matter in alpine lakes by utilizing approaches and methodologies from aquatic and geosciences. The main objective is to improve the understanding of lake optical responses to climate changes and solar forcing under a multimillennial temporal scale. The results will be important in assessing carbon pathways, lake metabolism, and UV exposure of mountain lakes and evaluating aquatic ecosystem responses to the global change.

2017

2022