Lichens of the Alps: Diversity and Climate Change

The Alps being the largest natural and semi-natural environment in Central Europe are significantly affected by global warming. While a broader public is concerned with the dramatic retreat of glaciers, biologists are more alarmed by changes of the biotic environment. Effects on higher plant vegetation came under scrutiny, but important ecological backbones represented by lower plants, cryptogams and hidden microbial powers have not been studied carefully. In this project we want to concentrate on lichens as a predominant symbioses life form of higher altitudes in the Alps. Lichens are unique models of fungal symbioses with macroscopically recognizable and light-exposed individuals. We shall summarize the numerous but scattered baseline information on lichen biodiversity in the Alps. This will lead to a transnational inventory of all lichens present in the Alps. This information will be of use for experts, decision-makers and amateurs. In the second part of the project we shall focus on two target habitats for assessing climate change effects with a selected group of lichens occurring on bryophytes and plant remnants. We shall assess the impact of changing conditions on lichen occurrence in a selected set of summit and glacier-retreat regions. We intend to use the muscicolous species of the lichen genus Rinodina and its associating lichens as indicators. The peculiar taxonomy of the muscicolous taxa of the genus Rinodina will be elucidated with molecular methods.

The Alps are the most extensive mountain range system in Central Europe, stretching approximately 1,200 kilometres across eight European countries, and including fourteen national parks. The Alpine Convention emphasizes the importance of this area and encourages transnational research and conservation projects. Lichens as unique models of fungal symbioses with macroscopically recognizable, light-exposed individuals are important colonizers of rock, soil and plant material, and they are a dominant life form of higher altitudes in the Alps. The project comprised three paths: 1.) A comprehensive inventory of lichen diversity of the Alps. 2.) An assessment of the impact of changing local conditions on lichen occurrence in a selected set of glacier forefields using soil-dwelling lichens as indicators. 3.) Clarifying the taxonomy of arctic-alpine species of the lichen genus Rinodina living on bryophytes and decaying plants by using molecular characters.We have summarized the abundant but scattered baseline information on lichen biodiversity in the Alps, which leads to a transnational inventory of all lichen taxa (c. 3,000), including data on their horizontal and vertical distribution and their ecology. An online database provides further features as a query interface which generates lists of species, e.g. for a geographic entity or an altitudinal belt. Furthermore, we are planning to insert distribution maps and photos for a large number of the presented lichen taxa. This lichen inventory of the Alps will be of use for experts, decision-makers, and citizen scientists.We examined communities of soil-dwelling lichens along a gradient of distance from the glacier edge in five glacier forefields in the Eastern Alps (Pasterze and Gaisbergferner in Austria, Rötkees and Matscherferner in Italy and Morteratsch in Switzerland). In total, eighty-three lichen species were found. Our studies indicate that richer lichen communities can be found at increasing terrain aging. Reproduction strategy and photobiont type (= the algae or the cyanobycteria in the lichen symbiosis) play an important role in the colonization process. Species dispersed by spores have more chances to rapidly reach recently deglaciated moraines, and the pattern of lichens with cyanobacterial photobionts suggests a greater importance of the nitrogen fixation capacity in younger terrains.The lichen genus Rinodina, with approximately 300 species, has been subject to few phylogenetic studies. We investigated the Rinodina mniaraea group which previously has not been subjected to molecular and detailed phenotypic studies. By conducting detailed morphological, anatomical, chemical and molecular phylogenetic methods, we show that chemical morphs within the R. mniaraea group should be recognized as distinct species (R. mniaraea (Ach.) Körb., R. mniaraeiza (Nyl.) Arnold, R. cinnamomea (Th. Fr.) Räsänen).