Open Access

Call for Open Access Projects

SoWa (Research Infrastructure for Comprehensive Monitoring of Soil and Water Ecosystems in Context of Sustainable Use of Landscape) is a newly established Research Infrastructure.

The aim of this call for projects is to open up SoWa research facilities to external users with interesting scientific projects coming from all over the world.

Eligible users

Eligible users are research organizations and individual researchers conducting research, development, and innovation, e.g. universities, research institutes, or companies interested in joint research cooperation with SoWa. Both Czech and international (EU and non-EU) applicants are welcome.

The use of specified SoWa facilities in the framework of the open access project is conditioned by partialcoverage of the necessary costs to SoWa by the user not covered from other sources by the project applicant e.g. to cover excessive cost of consumables or other items. Purely commercial research (resulting in the development or innovation of a specific product) cannot be subject of open access, but SoWa may devote some capacity to carry out research on commercial basis (with fair profit payment to SoWa). Applicants interested in commercial research should contact us directly.

Questions about available technologies and technical feasibility of your research project should be directed to the research facility leaders, whose contact details are specified in the section people and services or on a services page. For general enquiries, please contact projects.sowa@bc.cas.cz.

Evaluation process

This is a rolling call. All received project proposals will immediately undergo the evaluation process. Technical feasibility of presented research projects, and scientific and technological excellence will be major criteria for evaluation. Users must comply with all relevant health and occupational safety rules. All other legal or ethical issues which may apply are under the responsibility of the applicant (user).

All applicants will be informed about the outcome of the evaluation process within four months of the project application submission. The steering committee will decide as soon as certain amount of application accumulates but at least three times a year, in January, May, and September each year. Should the a project be positively assessed; the project proposers will be promptly invited to discuss specific details of the cooperation.

Intellectual property generated within the research projects belongs to the user. In the case of a joint research project with the SoWa researchers the results might belong to the hosting facility according to the conditions negotiated between the applicant and SoWa (e.g. co-authorship, acknowledgements).

SoWa retains the right to make lists of users and short summaries of their Open Access research projects publicly available. There is no legal claim for this research Open Access cooperation. This call is neither a public offer nor a public tender.

IRMS Laboratory

Expertise and instrumentation to explore stable isotope distributions in soil and aquatic environments.

Analytical Laboratory

Freshwater Chemistry Research Station

The research station studies the key processes that affect the functioning of aquatic ecosystems, such as nutrient input and nutrient cycling between land and water. We quantify the main matter and energy flows in freshwater ecosystems and elucidate how nutrient fluxes integrate with biological and biochemical dynamics.

Anaerobic and Molecular Microbiology Laboratory

The laboratory is dedicated to the study of diversity of functional groups of organisms and their interactions in soil and sediment nitches differing in availability of oxygen.

Aquatic Mesocosm Unit

The main focus is placed on the measurement of functional dependencies in freshwater ecosystems by combining laboratory experiments, mesocosm arrays, and in situ studies, with emphasis on ecosystems under anthropogenic stress.

Freshwater Biology Research Station

The research station team is able to determine how predator-prey interactions involving top predators (i.e., fishes in reservoirs and predatory macroinvertebrates in smaller fishless waters) affect, via top-down effects, trophic cascades and potential ecological regime shifts. We follow direct and indirect impacts of anthropogenic stress on individuals, populations, and communities through (i) alterations in habitat and niche […]

Plant-soil Functional Laboratory

The laboratory mainly deals with plant-microbial interactions in terrestrial ecosystems. It is mainly focused on differences in C:N:P stoichiometry between plant material entering the soil and soil microbial biomass, which determine the relationship between C:N:P sequestration into the soil OM and its mineralization. We are able to characterize the rhizodeposition quality and elemental stoichiometry under N […]

Laboratory of Organic Matter Chemistry

The laboratory focuses on the interaction of plant litter with litter-associated soil biota. The processing of leaf litter affects not only the release of nutrients, but also the formation of soil aggregates and, consequently, the formation of the entire soil profile. These processes connect composition of soil biota community with plant litter quality on one side […]

Experimental Catchment

Experimental catchment will consist of a set of instruments placed within two parallel microcatchments, which allows the measurement of the input of water and nutrients, along with outputs of water and nutrients from the catchment and the balance of OM accumulated in the catchment. Complex balance of matter and energy in the catchment can then be […]

Biogeochemistry Laboratory

The laboratory focuses on the transformations of C, P, and Fe on the gradient of settling seston – i.e. sediment diagenesis; the role of the different electron acceptors in the particle-associated C, P, Fe cycling; the fate of bioavailable Fe in reservoirs; and the overall methane emission from temperate reservoirs. We describe in-situ sediment properties and use […]

Lake Hydrodynamics Laboratory

The laboratory focuses on the detailed study of complex water movements in and above the sediments, which have a key influence on sediment/particle physics and chemistry, with special emphasis on the importance of sediment disturbances or flush events for the freshwater ecosystem. Using a set of both laboratory and field ADP and ADCP instruments, we cover […]

Microbial Ecology of Nitrogen and Carbon Cycling (MENCC)

The laboratory focuses on studying organisms involved in the aerobic oxidation of mineral nitrogen and methane.