Ricerc@Sapienza

IIn the context of the MAES (Mapping and Assessments of Ecosystem Services) process, this study is aimed at mapping and assessing the main Regulating Ecosystem Services (ES) provided by the Green Infrastructure (GI) of the Metropolitan City of Rome (5352 Km2). Different regulating Ecosystem Services (ES) will be considered such as particulate matter (PM10) and tropospheric ozone (O3) removal by different forest and shrub ecosystems, the mitigation of the Urban Heat Island effect (UHI), and the estimation of the urban Carbon stock,. The approach will involve the characterization of the main land cover and ecosystems using Sentinel-2 images, allowing for a detailed assessment of this ES. Different policy levels and environmental contexts will be considered within the Metropolitan city of Rome and a monetary valuation, on the basis of externality values, will be assessed. Moreover to assess the relationship between the accumulation and chemical speciation of PM with plant functionality, magnetic properties of tree leaves (collaboration with Dr. Aldo Winkler, INGV), as well as chemical characterization of PM adsorbed on leaves, will be measured concurrently with photosynthetic traits (chlorophyll a fluorescence measurements). The combination of such different measurement approaches could contribute to assess if PM can act as a stressor of the main tree species used in the urban forestry. The multidisciplinary approach that will be developed in this project can provide an exhaustive overview on how Green Infrastructure Strategy can improve ecosystems and human health in urban context.