conferences participation and networking

The interplay of natural and anthropogenic environmental stressors exerts profound impacts on biota, spanning from subtle molecular changes to pronounced phenotypic responses spanning generations. These responses shape the resistance and resilience of individuals and populations over both short and long-term periods, influencing current and future ecological dynamics. Understanding how early-life and historical exposures to contaminants translate into phenotypic effects, even across successive generations, is vital for ecological risk assessment. However, the intricate link between phenotypic outcomes and underlying mechanisms of long term and chronic effects remains largely unexplored. This session seeks to bridge critical knowledge gaps by exploring the stability and persistence of effects in organisms, including but not limited to multi- and transgenerational scales, irrespective of pulse exposure, continued exposure or renewed environmental challenges. Recent studies indicate that developmental and chronic exposure to environmental contaminants such as micro- and nano-plastics, PFOS/PFAS, pharmaceuticals, toxins, and endocrine disruptors can induce persisting and heritable physiological, reproductive, and behavioural effects. These adverse impacts, molecularly mediated namely by gene expression and their regulatory epigenetic mechanisms, may compromise organisms’ fitness and adaptive capacity across generations. We invite contributions that study long term effects of single and multiple stressors. We are particularly interested in studies employing advanced technologies, including genetic manipulations, and omics approaches (transcriptomics, metabolomics, epigenomics), but also novel complex experimental designs to uncover these mechanisms in both model and non-model organisms. Our goal is to facilitate the integration into ecological risk assessment frameworks of biomarkers that can reflect long term effects of contaminants in the biota. We encourage submissions that provide novel insights into the mechanistic basis of long-term ecological impacts, with an emphasis on emerging contaminants and their complex, eventually cross-generational effects. Join us in this session to advance the frontier of ecological research, bridging between molecular biology and ecological risk assessment, and paving the way for more comprehensive environmental protection strategies.

Environmental stressors, whether natural, anthropogenic, or their interplay, exert a profound impact on biota. This impact spans from imperceptible molecular alterations to distinct phenotypic responses that shape short- and long-term resistance and resilience in individuals and populations, both now and in the future. Understanding how early-life and historical exposures translate into phenotypic effects, even across consecutive generations, is imperative. The link between phenotypic and molecular levels remains largely enigmatic.
Moreover, exploring multi- and trans-generational stability of specific effects and impacts, even in organisms no longer exposed or facing renewed environmental challenges, is crucial. Recent evidence suggests that developmental and chronic exposure to environmental contaminants induces adverse physiological, reproductive, and behavioural effects that are heritable and persist across multiple generations, which can ultimately compromise organisms’ fitness and adaptive capacity. Epigenetic mechanisms are implicated in maintaining these cross-generational effects, but specific epigenetic biomarkers of effects remain elusive.
This session seeks contributions to bridge these knowledge gaps, welcoming insights across taxa and scopes. We encourage studies shedding light on molecular mechanisms, including epigenome modifications, that mediate these effects. Abstracts employing genetic manipulations and omics technologies (e.g., transcriptomics, metabolomics, epigenomics) to uncover mechanisms in both model and non-model organisms are welcome. Our goal is to facilitate the integration of emerging findings on molecular events and multi-generational effects into ecological risk assessment. Emphasis is placed on emerging contaminants, including micro- and nano-plastics, PFOS/PFAS, pharmaceuticals, toxins, priority and persistent contaminants like endocrine disruptors.

Environmental stressors (natural, anthropogenic and/or their interplay) have an impact in the biota. This impact ranges from almost imperceptible molecular changes to well identifiable phenotypic responses that will shape the short- and long-term resistance and resilience of populations to similar and new pressures. The role of epigenetic changes (e.g. DNA methylation, histone modifications, non-coding RNAs) as the landscape of molecular initiating events of phenotypic change in response to stressors has been acknowledged in general, their incorporation in adverse outcome pathways for the environmental risk assessment of chemicals being advocated in particular.
Despite the evidence in the field has been growing in the recent past, little is known about the normal functioning and natural variation in epigenetic traits for environmental species, on whether or not changes in those traits are responsible for adverse outcomes or on the variability of the scope for epigenetic responses across different species. The generation and sharing of clarifying knowledge in this context is then critical to promote the incorporation of epigenetic responses in risk assessment frameworks as it will allow to better establish (i) reliable epigenetic endpoints and biomarkers; (ii) representative models from different environmental compartments whose epigenome is sensitive and responsible in a stable way; (iii) sources of and ways to control experimental uncertainty; (iv) parallels between epigenetic responses across model organisms and between these and humans; (v) links between epigenomic initiating events and phenotypic effects, completing adverse outcome pathways potentially allowing read-across within specific classes of chemicals; (vi) efficient and sustainable methods to access stressor-induced changes in the epigenome; (vii) guidelines to identify and interpret evolutionary consequences of stressor-induced epigenetic changes. We invite contributions that can provide insights into these gaps, regardless to the taxa or the specific scope focused, and hope that this session can become a fruitful forum to share knowledge, ideas, and discuss future directions that will facilitate the incorporation of the emerging findings in environmental epigenetics into environmental risk assessment in the future.