The Hohe Tauern National Park (NPHT) and its region has been conducting specific monitoring programs for research purposes for years, all with links to eLTER. The platform includes a number of measuring facilities, which are all described in specific research sites each, i.e. LTER Hohe Tauern National Park (NPHT), Sonnblick Observatory, Oberes Stubachtal, Mullwitzkees, Venedigerkess and Pasterze. This LTSER platform picks up all possible monitoring acvities within the NPHT region and makes them available for eLTER. The platform is able to carry out and promote natural and social science work.

This site includes many lakes and temporary pools of the northern slope of Northern Apennines located between 1000 and 1850 m a.s.l. Most of these lakes are of glacial origin and some are still in pristine conditions. Research activity has been mainly addressed to the study of water bodies in the province of Parma within the boundaries of the Alta Val Parma e Alta Val Cedra Regional Park and the Tuscan-Emilian Apennines National Park, but also to lentic ecosystems in other apenninic watersheds in the frame of studies at regional scale. The site also includes more than 30 high altitude lakes, located in the Ossola and Sesia Valleys, Piedmont, at an altitude between 1900 and 2700 m a.s.l. Most of the lake catchments are of glacial origin and located in remote areas, not affected by direct anthropogenic forcing. Research activity is mainly focused on two lakes, Lake Paione Inferiore and Superiore, located in the Bognanco Valley, at 2002 and 2269 m a.s.l., respectively. Despite the small areas of the lakes, they are included as permanent research sites in long-term monitoring programme, both at national and international level. These lakes are subject to the deposition of atmospheric pollutants, transported with the air masses from source areas, and to the effect of climate change. High altitude lakes are particularly useful in the research studies on both biotic and abiotic processes, and their vulnerability make them early warning indicators of climate change. This site includes Lake Tovel located in the Parco Naturale Adamello Brenta (UNESCO site - Brenta Dolomites). Since 1980 the lake is part of the International Ramsar Convention for the protection of natural sites of particular interest. Tovel is famous for its Red Bay, site of past red summer blooms caused by the dinoflagellate alga Tovellia sanguinea. Because of its pseudokarst catchment, the lake has a very dynamic hydrology, that renders Tovel, notwithstanding it’s modest altitude, similar to a high altitude environment. Under this aspect, Lake Tovel is an ideal site to study biological and physical phenomena tied to climate change. The site includes also 14 lakes of the province of Bolzano located at altitudes ranging from 216 to 1642 m a.s.l. and of area ranging from 1 to 131 hectars, mostly of glacial origin and all in different ways exposed to human influence. Some of them have a high natural value due to their location and characteristics and are for this reason included in the lakes monitored under the European waterframe directive 2000/60/EC. The research activity is mainly focused on two lakes with particularly high naturalistic value (the lakes of Anterselva and Braies) and on a lake interesting for the follow up of the effects of the restauration measures undertaken to counteract its precarious situation (Small Lake of Monticolo).

Our work focuses on a metropolitan area that includes the nation’s sixth largest city, Phoenix, as well as 22 other municipalities and spans Maricopa County and a small portion of Pinal County, Arizona. We engage biological, physical, engineering, and social scientists in research that provides a foundation for understanding urban socio-ecological systems in an arid, but rapidly growing, metropolitan area.

UK ECN site. The Loch Lomond basin is of glacial origin, formed by an ice sheet moving southward from the Ben Lui area and depositing eroded material in the southern-most part by Balloch, thus ensuring that the loch was freshwater loch rather than marine. It is the largest (by surface area) body of freshwater in Britain, with a surface area of 71km2. The natural catchment area is ten times greater, at 781km2. The two main feeder rivers are the River Falloch at the northern-most point, with a mean flow of 6.8 cumecs, and the River Endrick entering on the south-eastern side of the loch, with a mean flow of 7.8 cumecs. They have markedly different catchments - the Falloch's is mountainous with a catchment area of 80km2, whilst the Endrick's is a typical lowland rural catchment of 220km2. There are distinct differences in the chemistry of the two rivers, reflecting the differences in the geology of their catchments. The Highland Boundary fault cuts across the lower part of Loch Lomond, but there is also a narrow physical restriction halfway down the length of the loch. For these reasons, the water chemistry and topography are quite different between the so-called Northern and Southern Basins and, as a result, there are two ECN sampling sites, one from each basin.

Retezat LTER site is located in the western part of the Southern Carpathians. Retezat massif was declared a biosphere reserve in 1979, due to its landscape diversity, geological complexity, composition of the flora and vegetation. Retezat National Park is famous for its floral diversity, hosting more than 1190 species of plants. Forests cover about 49 % of the area , the most widespread species are beech ( Fagus sylvatica ), spruce ( Picea abies ) , mountain pine (Pinus mugo ) , fir ( Abies alba), maple (Acer pseudoplatanus ) , birch ( Betula pendula) , alder ( Alnus viridis ) , elm ( Ulmus glabra) , Rowan ( Sorbus aucuparia ) . Pinus cembre opulation is probably the most representative of the Carpathian Mountains. The long term research network was placed in Retezat National Park in 2000, comprising 11 research plots (with a 0.25 ha surface) placed in representative forest or alpine ecosystems.

The site Petrohan is situated in the West Balkan range with a total area of 7192 ha. The relief of the region is mountain, steep, with deeply cut river valleys and secondary watersheds with lowest point at altitude 350 m, and highest at 1900 m. The ecological station is situated at 1470 m asl. The hydrological network is dense with constant water flow during the whole year. The prevailing soil type is Distric-Eutric- Cambisols on granite with mean depth up to 80 cm, pH of the soil solution is 4.5- 6.0 pH, C/N- 12-14 and the content of nitrogen in the soil over 1 %. The part of protected forest is 74 %, differentiated as area for water resources including drinking water. The beech forest in the site has been managed since 1893. The total stock is 1 989 695 m3, stock per ha 298 m3, total annual growth 24271 m3 and growth per ha 3.64 m3. The site Petrohan is established in 1986. Hydrochemical investigations include bulk and throughfall (beech and spruce) deposition, stemflow, soil solution, water flow. The following parameters are measured: water amount of bulk precipitation, troughfall, stem flow, lysimetric flow, as well as pH, elecroconductivity and chemistry of all studied compartments (NO3-, SO42-, Cl-, NH4+, K+, Na+, Ca2+, Mg2+, Pd2+, Cd2+), soil chemistry, air temperature, humidity, phenology, annual growth, biomass chemistry. Critical loads of acidifying pollutants and heavy metals have been determined since 1994 for both forest and water.

A unique mosaic of ecosystems of topmost summits (lichen tundra), grasslands and peat bogs of the summit plateaux (grassy tundra) and leeward slopes of glacial cirques of the Krkonose/Giant Mts (flower-rich tundra). It represents an unusual combination of Nordic, Central European and alpine organisms and their communities. It covers an area of 47 km2, i.e. 7.4% out of the whole area of the Krkonose/Giant Mts (32 km2 in the Czech part and 15 km2 in the Polish part of the Krkonose/Giant Mts).

Yanting Agro-ecological Experimental Station of Purple Soil of CAS locates at LinShan, Yanting (105 º 27 'E, 31 º 16' N) in the north-central Sichuan Basin. It was established in 1980 and became a member of the Chinese Ecosystem Research Network (CERN) in 1991. In 2005, it was selected to be a National Key Field Research Station. In 2007, the Station became one of the Soil and Water Conservation Sci-Tech Demonstration Zones under the Ministry of Water Resources. It is also one of the observatory sites of Global Terrestrial Observation System (GTOS) and a key field station under the Ministry of Agriculture. Yanting has a humid subtropical monsoon climate, with an annual average temperature of 17.5 ℃ and an average annual rainfall of 826 mm, and its annual frost-free period is averagely 290 days. Its landscape is featured by hills. The outcropped rock strata are purplish sand-mudstones formed in Jurassic and Cretaceous period. The soil is called locally purple soil. It is classified as Eutric Regosols in the FAO Soil Taxonomy and as Pup-Orthic-Entisols in the Chinese Soil Taxonomy. Yanting Station represents typical farmland ecosystems dominated by purple soils in the Sichuan Basin in the subtropical region.

The Fengqiu Experimental Station for Agro-ecology Chinese Academy of Sciences is located in the Pandian countryside, Fengqiu county, Henan Province, China (114°24′E, 35°00′N), with flat terrain and an average altitude of 67.5 m above sea level. This region has a typical monsoon climate with an average annual temperature of 13.9 °C and average annual precipitation of approximately 615 mm. The soil is derived from the alluvial sediments of the Yellow River and is classified as an aquic inceptisol (a calcareous, fluvo-aquic sandy loam (Soil Survey Staff, 2010)), with a sandy loam texture at the plough layer (0-20 cm). The experimental station is located in a region typical of the North China Plain, with the prevailing cropping system of wheat-corn rotation. The Station has 9.41 hectares of experimental fields, equipped with 1300 square meters of laboratories, 1500 square meters of living rooms, complete experimental equipments and living facilities, and two investigative cars. The Fengqiu Station is one of the main experimental field base, deployed by the country and Chinese Academy of Sciences in the Huang-Huai-Hai Plain and devoted to the agriculture, resource, ecology and environment research.

The site Jochberg is part of the European Level II Forest Monitoring System in the frame of the International Co-operative Programme on Assessment and Monitoring of Air Pollution Effects on Forests (ICP Forests). This site is one out of 16 Austrian Level II sites; it was established in 1995 and is, since 2006, part of the LTER Austria network. The site is situated in the east of the federal country Tyrol in the Austrian Central Alps about 15 km south of the skiing-resort Kitzbühel at 1050 m a.s.l., in a 95 year old managed spruce forest.