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Spatial and temporal variations in airborne Ambrosia pollen in Europe

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posted on 2017-03-23, 15:03 authored by B. Sikoparija, C. A. Skjøth, S. Celenk, C. Testoni, T. Abramidze, K. Alm Kübler, J. Belmonte, U. Berger, M. Bonini, A. Charalampopoulos, A. Damialis, B. Clot, Å. Dahl, L. A. de Weger, R. Gehrig, M. Hendrickx, L. Hoebeke, N. Ianovici, A. Kofol Seliger, D. Magyar, G. Mányoki, S. Milkovska, D. Myszkowska, A. Páldy, C. H. Pashley, K. Rasmussen, O. Ritenberga, V. Rodinkova, O. Rybníček, V. Shalaboda, I. Šaulienė, J. Ščevková, B. Stjepanović, M. Thibaudon, C. Verstraeten, D. Vokou, R. Yankova, M. Smith
The European Commission Cooperation in Science and Technology (COST) Action FA1203 “SMARTER” aims to make recommendations for the sustainable management of Ambrosia across Europe and for monitoring its efficiency and cost-effectiveness. The goal of the present study is to provide a baseline for spatial and temporal variations in airborne Ambrosia pollen in Europe that can be used for the management and evaluation of this noxious plant. The study covers the full range of Ambrosia artemisiifolia L. distribution over Europe (39°N–60°N; 2°W–45°E). Airborne Ambrosia pollen data for the principal flowering period of Ambrosia (August–September) recorded during a 10-year period (2004–2013) were obtained from 242 monitoring sites. The mean sum of daily average airborne Ambrosia pollen and the number of days that Ambrosia pollen was recorded in the air were analysed. The mean and standard deviation (SD) were calculated regardless of the number of years included in the study period, while trends are based on those time series with 8 or more years of data. Trends were considered significant at p < 0.05. There were few significant trends in the magnitude and frequency of atmospheric Ambrosia pollen (only 8% for the mean sum of daily average Ambrosia pollen concentrations and 14% for the mean number of days Ambrosia pollen were recorded in the air). The direction of any trends varied locally and reflected changes in sources of the pollen, either in size or in distance from the monitoring station. Pollen monitoring is important for providing an early warning of the expansion of this invasive and noxious plant.

Funding

We acknowledge support from EU COST Action FA1203 “Sustainable management of Ambrosia artemisiifolia in Europe (SMARTER)” (http://ragweed.eu). The authors acknowledge the A.I.A. (Italian Association of Aerobiology) and the Italian ARPAs (Regional Environmental Protection Agencies) for providing Italian pollen data. This work was partly financed by the following COST Short Term Scientific Missions: COST-STSM-FA1203-020215-053027 to CT, COST-STSM-FA1203-20573, ECOST-STSM-FA1203-250415-058150. B. Sikoparija is supported by Ministry of Science Republic of Serbia project no. III43002, C. A. Skjøth is supported by European Commission through a Marie Curie Career Integration Grant (Project ID CIG631745) and Danish Research Council, Acronym SUPREME. C. H. Pashley is supported by the Midlands Asthma and Allergy Research Association (MAARA) and the National Institute for Health Research Leicester Respiratory Biomedical Research Unit and the views expressed are those of the author(s) and not necessarily those of the NHS, the NIHR or the Department of Health. Sevcan Celenk is supported by Research Foundation of Uludag University project no 2011/76 and The Scientific and Technological Research Council of Turkey (TUBITAK) project no 109S032. The authors would also like to thank the following for their expert technical assistance: Iveta Lankova†, the National Institute of Public Health, Praha, Czech Republic; J. Corden and W. Millington, Midlands Asthma and Allergy Research Association (MAARA), UK; A. Fairs, Department of Infection, Immunity & Inflammation, University of Leicester, UK; D. Gioulekas, Pulmonary Department, G.P. Hospital “G. Papanikolaou”, Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, Greece; Predrag Radišić, University of Novi Sad, Serbia.

History

Citation

Aerobiologia, 2016, pp. 1-9

Author affiliation

/Organisation/COLLEGE OF MEDICINE, BIOLOGICAL SCIENCES AND PSYCHOLOGY/School of Medicine/Department of Infection, Immunity and Inflammation

Version

  • VoR (Version of Record)

Published in

Aerobiologia

Publisher

Springer Verlag (Germany), International Association for Aerobiology (IAA)

issn

0393-5965

eissn

1573-3025

Acceptance date

2016-10-14

Copyright date

2016

Available date

2017-03-23

Publisher version

https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10453-016-9463-1

Notes

The online version of this article (doi:10.1007/s10453-016-9463-1) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users

Language

en

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