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The Project

ARISTO brings together the expertise of industry and academia to train the next generation of soil ecotoxicologists in order to develop tools, methods and procedures to assess in the most comprehensive and robust way the toxicity of pesticides on soil microorganisms. ARISTO will bring research breakthroughs and at the same time will have a major impact in the future regulatory framework regarding the Environmental Risk Assessment of Pesticides.  It builds on a tiered assessment approach (in vitro, to in soil, to ecosystem scale) using ammonia-oxidizing microorganisms (AOM) and arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi (AMF) as key indicators for functional microbial diversity in soil. 

The European Industry - Academia Network for RevIsing and Advancing the Assessment of the Soil Microbial TOxicity of Pesticides Pesticides are major environmental pollutants. The European Commission has imposed a stringent pesticide regulatory scheme for pesticides authorisation, where risk assessment for aquatic organisms and terrestrial macro-organisms is well defined. In contrast the assessment of the toxicity of pesticides on soil microorganisms is lagging behind. EFSA identified soil microorganisms as an attribute to monitor during pesticides environmental risk assessment and stressed the need for novel tests to assess the toxicity of pesticides on soil microorganisms. The ARISTO project will fulfil this scientific and regulatory gap through a unique doctoral program, based on the strong interaction of academia and industry. These will produce benchmarking knowledge supporting the development of advanced tools and procedures, based on the response of key microbial indicator groups, for the comprehensive assessment of the toxicity of pesticides on soil microorganisms. ARISTO will employ 9 PhD fellows and provide to them a challenging training program aiming to develop: (1) pioneering in vitro tests, as a first conservative step, to assess the toxicity of pesticides on distinct ammonia-oxidizing microorganisms and arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi (2) advanced lab and field tests to assess the toxicity of pesticides on natural soil assemblages of AOM and AMF, as a more realistic toxicity assessment step; (3) an ecosystem-level toxicity assessment looking at pesticide effects at microbial networks and across different trophic levels along the soil food web (predator - prey); (4) novel tools to determine the soil microbial toxicity of pesticide mixtures, and bio-pesticides; (5) and validate advanced in silico tools for prioritizing pesticide transformation products with potential toxicity to soil microbes. The consortium of ARISTO comprises 7 academic and 9 industrial beneficiaries and 5 partners from 9 countries including Israel and Australia 

PROJECT MANAGEMENT

DISSEMINATION, COMMUNICATION AND OUTREACH ACTIVITIES

The main objective of WP2 is to establish an effective plan of dissemination, communication and outreach activities which will:

1.   connect the findings of ARISTO with all relevant scientific audiences maximizing its scientific impact,
2.   make available key project findings to relevant research bodies, industrial actors, EU regulatory bodies and NGOs associated with  environmental protection
3.   reach broader audiences interested in environmental safety, pesticides safe use and control (e.g. general public, non-academic professionals)

IN SOIL ASSESSMENT OF THE SOIL MICROBIAL TOXICITY OF PESTICIDES

The main objectives of WP5 will be

1.   to develop methods and protocols to assess the toxicity of pesticides on AMF and AOM at the lab (soil microcosms) and field scale
2.   to explore potential toxicity mechanisms using advanced molecular tools to investigate the impact of pesticides on newly identified (comammox bacteria) and/or functionally dependent to AOM microbial groups (i.e. NOB)

ECOSYSTEM LEVEL ASSESSMENT OF THE SOIL MICROBIAL TOXICITY OF PESTICIDES

The main objectives of WP6 will be:

1.   to assess the ecological response patterns of soil microbial networks to pesticide exposure to
2.   determine the impact of pesticides on microbial predators (protists) and prey (bacteria) and the thereof resulting consequences for ecosystem functioning

ASSESSMENT OF THE SOIL MICROBIAL TOXICITY OF PESTICIDE MIXTURES AND BIOPESTICIDES

The main objectives of WP7 will be:

1.   to define methods for assessing and predicting the soil microbial toxicity of commercial pesticide mixtures
2.   to explore the potential of biopesticides to exhibit soil microbial toxicity

A SSESSMENT OF THE SOIL MICROBIAL TOXICITY OF PESTICIDE TRANSFORMATION PRODUCTS

The main objective of WP8 will be to develop, optimize and validate in silico tools for the screening of pesticide transformation products for toxicity on soil microorganisms

ETHICS EVALUATION

The main objective of WP9 will be to assess any ethic issues during the project duration and provide evidence that all relevant solutions were mitigated and resolved.