Wetlands - Topical Collections
WETLANDS publishes Topical Collections on a wide range of topics (please see listed below).
How to submit?
Submit your article to one of the Topical Collections via Editorial Manager or by clicking on the Submit manuscript button on the home page of Wetlands. At first submission select the article type: research article, short communications or review. Further down during submission you will be asked if you are submitting to a Topical Collection. Please select ‘yes’ and choose one the Topical Collections from the drop down menu.
Once accepted for publication, these papers will appear in the regular online issues of WETLANDS as normal and simultaneously also in one the continuous collections on the specific topic. The title of the collection will also be included in a banner in the online PDF of the article. For further information, please feel free to contact the Editor in Chief, Marinus L. Otte.
Please find detailed information about each of the Topical Collections below and view already published articles via the clickable links:
Coastal and Estuarine Wetlands
Ecosystem Services and Social and Economic Aspects of Wetlands
Forested Wetlands Floodplains, and Riparian Corridors
Spring ecosystems and associated wetlands and headwaters
Wetland Biota
Wetland Conservation and Restoration
Wetland Ecosystems: Past, Present, and Future
Wetlands Education
Wetland Hydrology and Geomorphology
Wetland Policy and Legislation
Wetland Soils, Biogeochemistry and Microbiology
Authors are invited to submit regular research articles, short communications and review papers under this Topical Collection. This collection highlights research by and for managers and practitioners, as well as engineered/constructed wetlands. Examples include wetland condition assessment, wetland delineation, mitigation banking, conservation, and management, as well as studies on hydrological design, substrates, biogeochemical processes and cycling related to efficacy, construction of wetlands for the purpose of hydraulic buffering, improvement of water quality, and creation of habitat, as well as follow-up studies on the success of such efforts.
Coastal and Estuarine Wetlands
This collection includes research on wetlands such as lagoons, mangroves, seagrass beds, salt marshes, and estuarine tidal wetlands, as well as freshwater and brackish wetlands along large bodies of water, such as the Great Lakes in North America, the Baltic Sea and the Black Sea in Europe, and the Caspian Sea between Europe and Asia. Because they are in a strategic location for trade, these systems are often heavily impacted by urban and industrial developments. They are also threatened by sea level rise. At the same time, they provide protection from the effects of severe storms, and are of invaluable importance to fisheries.
Ecosystem Services of Wetlands and Social and Economic Aspects of Wetlands
This collection highlights research related to ecosystem services and the value of wetlands in terms of ecology, economy and the well-being of humans and their environment. Such studies are particularly relevant in light of the growing global population and urbanization, resulting in ever-increasing demands for clean water. Examples include the social, aesthetic, and economic values of wetlands to regional populations and their cultures, value of preserving/managing one type of wetland over another, as well as the need for regionally/globally unified regulatory frameworks. This collection also highlights regions where thinking about and regulations pertaining to sustainable management of water and wetlands is lagging behind other regions in the world, for example because of economical or societal restraints, and the often under-reported value of wetlands to the communities, cultures and traditions of indigenous people around the world.
Forested Wetlands, Floodplains and Riparian Corridors
This collection highlights research on wetlands with trees, natural or planted, as well as wetlands along streams and rivers. Examples include studies on tree ecology and ecophysiology, seed dispersal, and biodiversity, as well as silviculture in wetlands. It also highlights the importance of riparian corridors to migration of organisms and energy flow, their functions in hydrological buffering and in removal of pollutants from waters, in provision of connectivity between streams and wetlands, and on changes due to alterations in hydrology.
Authors are invited to submit regular research articles, short communications and review papers under this specific Topical Collection. This collection highlights research related to peatlands, including, for example, studies on permafrost, carbon storage, effects of climate change, ecology, restoration, and conservation.
This collection highlights research related to wetlands designated as ‘Ramsar sites’, see http://www.ramsar.org/. The studies may be about specific Ramsar sites, about the Ramsar Convention and its further development, or any other issue related to wetlands and the Ramsar Convention.
Spring ecosystems and associated wetlands and headwaters
By any definition, wet ecosystems fed by springs are wetlands. They vary greatly depending on the chemical composition of the water and often harbor endemic species. These are critically endangered ecosystems, often altered to feed water supplies or turned into spas. Spring ecotones and related groundwater dependent ecosystems (GDE) are, and will ever increasingly be in the future, the source warranting base flow of most surface running-water systems. They are fundamental water resources and at the same time of pivotal importance for freshwater biodiversity conservation. They host threatened (Red List), rare, and often highly specialized and relatively isolated species. They are excellent sentinel environments to monitor the ecological effects of environmental and climate change.
Wetland Biota
This collection may include studies on diversity of plants, animals, algae and cyanobacteria, keystone species, wetlands as refuges for organisms, changes in wetland communities due to invasions of non-native species, and biota as indicators for condition and integrity assessments and monitoring of environmental and climate change.
Wetland Conservation and Restoration
This collection highlights any research related to conservation and restoration of wetlands. Examples include reports on the development of conservation policies and practices, studies on the success of conservation, reports on different approaches to wetland restoration and follow-up studies on the success of restoration, including comparisons with reference wetlands.
Wetland Ecosystems: Past, Present, and Future
This collection is about understanding the complex interactions among organisms and their environment, past present and future. The present conditions in ecosystems can help us understand past, as well as future conditions, but the other way around is true as well. For example, past conditions can help us understand future conditions as they are affected by global change. . The term 'global change' recognizes that it is not just climate change that is affecting the planet, but also changes such as more land being needed to support the ever-increasing global human population, requiring more space to live and grow food, and changing demands on resources. Examples include studies on community composition, species interactions, population dynamics, food-web analyses, mediation of ecosystem processes by wetland species, and distribution of wetland organisms in response to spatial and temporal variation in habitat factors, paleoecological, paleolimnological, paleohydrological, paleoclimatic or geochronological studies, effects of global and climate change on wetlands (for example changes in hydrology, annual precipitation, storm events, land uses) as well as on the effects of wetlands on global and climate change (for example carbon storage, release, hydrological buffering, storm protection).
Wetlands Education
Authors are invited to submit regular research articles, short communications and review papers under this specific Topical Collection. This collection highlights research related to formal and informal education about wetlands. Examples include the efficacy of education of targeted groups to improve understanding of the value of wetlands or topics such as the history of formal education about wetlands in schools and universities.
Wetland Hydrology and Geomorphology
Authors are invited to submit regular research articles, short communications and review papers under this specific Topical Collection. The presence of water at or near the surface is one of the three main characteristics defining a wetland. This collection includes studies focusing on hydrology and geomorphology at different spatial and temporal scales, for example within individual wetlands, wetland complexes, watersheds, and regional and global cycling of water.
Wetland Policy and Legislation
Policies and laws pertaining to wetlands are intended to guide management decisions and, ideally, promote sustainable use. However, these laws can also drive research, for example to determine what exactly constitutes a wetland, and how to best implement policy and law. This collection includes studies on the effects of changes in policy and law on wetlands, and on studies that address questions relevant to implementation of policy and law. This collection may also include reviews that state a particular opinion relating to policy and law.
Wetland Soils, Biogeochemistry and Microbiology
This topical collection highlights research on soils and sediments in wetlands. The biogeochemistry of wetlands is what sets them aside from all other types of ecosystems – particularly the juxtaposition of anaerobic and aerobic conditions. Microorganisms drive the unique biogeochemistry of wetlands and mediate important underlying ecosystem services such as element cycling and removal of pollutants from water. Examples of studies in this collection include soil physical, chemical and biological properties and processes, underlying cycling of elements and energy, biological and chemical aspects of carbon sequestration, and removal of pollutants from water, links to soil processes which influence land-surface interactions, and soil-surface water-groundwater interactions.