A DIRT (Detritus Input and Removal Treatments) experiment was initiated at the Sikfokut Forest LTER site in Hungary in November 2000. This study was designed to evaluate how sources and quantities of litter inputs control nutrient cycling and carbon storage in forest soils across sites with different climate, C and N status. Sikfokut Forest was selected for its high N deposition rate compared the Harvard Forest LTER, Bousson Forest and Andrews Forest LTER DIRT experiment sites in the United States. Trends in soil enzyme phosphatase and beta-glucosidase activity at Sikfokut indicate that the microbial community there is already clearly responding to reduced litter availability after only two years of treatment

The Hungarian ILTER Network consists of three sites representing the characteristic biomes in the country: lake Balaton ILTER site, Sikofut oak forest ILTER site, and the Kiskun sand forest-steppe ILTER site. Hungarian ecologists have developed broad multidisciplinary research projects, which can meet both the requirements of international research standards and the domestic needs of nature conservation and environment protection. Hungarian policy and decision makers have also recognised the importance of long-term ecological research. As a consequence different grants such as Hungarian R + D "Szechenyi", EU FWS Projects, OTKA and OTKA-NSF Projects, Joint grant of Ministry of Environment and the Hungarian Academy of Sciences were awarded in the last 2-3 years, what could create the basis of national and international research cooperations of Hungarian ILTER sites

The removal of organic pollutants presents a major challenge for drinking water treatment plants. The chemical oxygen demand (COD) is essentially the measure of oxidizable organic matter in source waters. In this study, we report that COD can efficiently be decreased by adding Fe(II)/Fe(III) and sulfite ion to the source water while purging it with air. In this process, oxygen is activated to oxidize the main constituents of COD, i.e. organic substrates, via the generation of reactive inorganic oxysulfur radical ions. In the end, the total amount of sulfur(IV) is converted to the non-toxic sulfate ion. It has been explored how the COD removal efficiency depends on the concentration of S(IV), the total concentration of iron species, the concentration ratio of Fe(II) and Fe(III), the purging rate and the contact time by using source water from a specific location (Királyhegyes, Hungary). The process has been optimized by applying the Response Surface Methodology (RSM). Under optimum conditions, the predicted and experimentally found COD removal efficiencies are in excellent agreement: 85.4% and 87.5%, respectively. The robustness of the process was tested by varying the optimum values of the parameters by ± 20%. It was demonstrated that the method is universally applicable because a remarkable decrease was achieved in COD, 62.0–88.5%, with source waters of various compositions acquired from 9 wells at other locations using the same conditions as in the case of Királyhegyes.

During the last 70 years 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6-Hexachlorocyclohexane (HCH) has been one of the most extensively used pesticides. Only the gamma-isomer has insecticidal properties. For the marketing of gamma-HCH (lindane) the other 85% HCH isomers which are formed as by-products during HCH production had to be separated and became finally hazardous waste. For each tonne of lindane 8–12 tonnes of waste HCH isomers were produced and production of the approximately 600,000 t of lindane has therefore generated 4.8 to 7.2 million tonnes of HCH/POPs waste. These waste isomers were mostly buried in uncontrolled dumps at many sites around the world. The stockpiles and the large contaminated sites can be categorized as “mega-sites”. Countries with HCH legacy problems include Albania, Argentina, Austria, Azerbaijan, Brazil, China, Croatia, Czech Republic, France, Germany, Hungary, India, Italy, Japan, Macedonia, Nigeria, Poland, Romania, Russia, Slovakia, South Africa, Spain, Switzerland, Turkey, The Netherlands, UK, Ukraine and the USA.As lindane and alpha- and beta-HCH have been listed as POPs in the Stockholm Convention since August 2010, the problem of stockpiles of HCH waste is now documented and globally acknowledged.This article describes briefly the legacy of HCH and lindane that has been created. Three of the mega-sites are being discussed and demonstrate the increase in pollution footprint over time. Recent developments in the EU (including the Sabinanigo project in Aragon/Spain) and on a global level are presented. A short overview is given on lack of activities and on actions of countries within their obligations as Parties of the Stockholm Convention. Furthermore, current country activities supported by the Global Environment Facility (GEF), the “financing mechanism” of the convention, are listed. Finally, conclusions and recommendations are formulated that will contribute to the solution of this problem over the next 25 years.

From December 1993 to January 1995 and from October 2009 to October 2010, a total of 320 and 365 daily samples of the PM2.5 were collected at a rural background site (National Atmospheric Observatory Košetice) in Central Europe. The PM2.5 samples were analyzed for 29 and 26 elements respectively by Particle-Induced X-ray Emission (PIXE) and water-soluble inorganic ions by Ion Chromatography (IC) in 2009/2010. The Positive Matrix Factorization (PMF) was applied to the chemical composition of PM2.5 to determine its sources. The decreasing trends of almost all elements concentrations, especially the metals regulated by the EU Directive (2004/107/EC) are evident. The annual median ratios indicate a decrease in concentrations of the PM2.5 elements. The slight increase of K concentrations and Spearman's rank correlation coefficient rs 0.09 K/Se points to a rise in residential wood combustion. The S concentrations are nearly comparable (higher mean in 2009/2010, while the annual median ratio is under 1). The five major source types in the mid-1990s were ascribed to brown coal combustion, oil combustion, sea salt and dust – long-range transport, re-suspended dust and black coal combustion. The industrial combustion of brown and/or black coal (rs 0.75 Se/As, rs 0.57 Ga/Ge and rs 0.20 As/Zn) and oil (rs 0.72 V/Ni) of the regional origin dominated. In the 1990s, the potential source regions were the border area of Czech Republic, German and Poland (brown coal), the Moravia-Silesia region at the Czech-Polish border (black coal), and Slovakia, Austria, Hungary, and the Balkans (oil). In 2009/2010, the apportioned sources were sulfate, residential heating, nitrate, industry, re-suspended dust, and sea salt and dust – long-range transport. The secondary sulfate from coal combustion and residential biomass burning (rs 0.96, K/K+) of local origin dominated.The declining trend of the elemental concentrations and change in the source pattern of the regional background PM2.5 in Central Europe between the mid-1990s and 2009/10 reflects the economic transformation and impact of stricter legislation in Central Europe.

Despite being one of the most expensive gourmet foods, it remains unclear if the iconic White Truffle (Tuber magnatum Pico; hereinafter WT) accumulates radioactivity at harmful levels comparable to other fungal species. Here, we measure the active radiocaesium-137 concentration (137Cs) in ten hypogeous WT fruitbodies from southern Hungary, and the soils in which they were growing. All WTs reveal non-significant 137Cs values, thus providing an ‘all clear’ for WT hunters in the species' northernmost habitats, where corresponding soil samples occasionally exhibit slight 137Cs concentrations. Our results are particularly relevant in the light of a rapidly increasing global demand for WTs and their subsequent trading extent and price inflation, because up to 600 kg of fresh fruitbodies are harvested each year in southern Hungary. Moreover, some of Europe's forest ecosystems, in which mushroom picking is common practise, are still contaminated with 137Cs from the Chernobyl fallout more than 30 years ago, posing a serious threat to human health.

Endocrine disrupting chemicals (EDCs) include a wide array of pollutants, such as some metals and other toxic elements, which may cause changes in hormonal homeostasis. In addition to affecting physiology of individuals directly, EDCs may alter the transfer of maternal hormones to offspring, i.e. causing transgenerational endocrine disruption. However, such effects have been rarely studied, especially in wild populations. We studied the associations between environmental elemental pollution (As, Cd, Cu, Ni, Pb) and maternally-derived egg thyroid hormones (THs) as well as nestling THs in great tits (Parus major) using extensive sampling of four pairs of polluted and reference populations across Europe (Finland, Belgium, Hungary, Portugal). Previous studies in these populations showed that breeding success, nestling growth and adult and nestling physiology were altered in polluted zones compared to reference zones. We sampled non-incubated eggs to measure maternally-derived egg THs, measured nestling plasma THs and used nestling faeces for assessing local elemental exposure. We also studied whether the effect of elemental pollution on endocrine traits is dependent on calcium (Ca) availability (faecal Ca as a proxy) as low Ca increases toxicity of some elements. Birds in the polluted zones were exposed to markedly higher levels of toxic elements than in reference zones at the populations in Finland, Belgium and Hungary. In contrast to our predictions, we did not find any associations between overall elemental pollution, or individual element concentrations and egg TH and nestling plasma TH levels. However, we found some indication that the effect of metals (Cd and Cu) on egg THs is dependent on Ca availability. In summary, our results suggest that elemental pollution at the studied populations is unlikely to cause overall TH disruption and affect breeding via altered egg or nestling TH levels with the current elemental pollution loads. Associations with Ca availability should be further studied.

The concentration of heavy metals and soil properties in fifty urban garden soils of Szeged (SE Hungary) were determined to evaluate the cumulative impacts of urbanization and cultivation on these soils. Using two enrichment factors (EFs) (based on reference horizon; Ti as reference element) and multivariate statistical analysis (PCA), the origin of the studied elements was defined.According to statistical coincidence of EFs confirmed by t-test, anthropogenic enrichment of Cu (EF = 4), Zn (EF = 2.7) and Pb (EF = 2.5) was significant in topsoils. Moreover, PCA also revealed the geogenic origin of Ni, Co, Cr and As and differentiated two groups of the anthropogenic metals [Pb, Zn] [Cu]. Spatial distribution of the metals visualized by GIS reflected the traffic origin of Pb; while based on ANOVA, the anthropogenic source of Cu is relevant (mainly pesticides) and there is a statistically significant difference in its concentration depending on land use.

We investigated lichen diversity in temperate oak forests using standardized protocols. Forty-eight sites were sampled in the Czech Republic, Slovakia and Hungary. The effects of natural environmental predictors and human influences on lichen diversity (lichen diversity value, species richness) were analysed by means of correlation tests. We found that lichen diversity responded differently to environmental predictors between two regions with different human impact. In the industrial region, air pollution was the strongest factor. In the agricultural to highly forested regions, lichen diversity was strongly influenced by forest age and forest fragmentation. We found that several natural factors can in some cases obscure the effect of human influences. Thus, factors of naturality gradient must be considered (both statistically and interpretively) when studying human impact on lichen diversity. We detected the different responses of lichens to ecological predictors in polluted and unpolluted areas.