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TREC

Traversing European Coastlines

An expedition to study coastal ecosystems and their response to the environment, from molecules to communities

The Expedition

The TREC expedition started in April 2023 and lasted until the end of July 2024. During that time, the researchers gathered biological samples and environmental data along the European coastline at 115 land-sea transects. In selected sites, time-series measurements are performed to account for annual changes.

The expedition combines ocean exploration, conducted by the Tara Ocean Foundation and Tara Oceans Consortium, with parallel sampling of soil, sediment, shallow water, and selected model organisms in various habitats, supported by EMBL’s land-based mobile services and local marine research institutions. Organismal diversity is being studied across scales, from viruses, bacteria, and protists to multicellular groups such as algae and animals. Analysis involves various meta- and single-cell omics as well as barcoding techniques that will be combined with innovative microscopy pipelines including automated imaging and electron microscopy. This allows unprecedented detail in associating molecular and morphological data at the single-organism and single-cell level. Besides standard oceanographic metadata, special emphasis is put on detecting metabolites as well as physical and chemical (i.e. inorganic and organic pollutants such as metals, pesticides, hormones, and antibiotics) characterization of the sampled habitats, providing the environmental framework to the biodiversity and adaptation analyses.

Overall, the expedition aims to conduct systematic, standardized, and integrated sampling with multimodal environmental metadata acquisition. This integrated profiling across environmental and man-made gradients of micro- and macroscopic life will enable us to obtain a first of the kind, pan-European census of European coastal ecosystems.

The TREC expedition is embedded in the TREC project, which is governed by the TREC consortium steering committee.

Biomes Sampling Coordinators

Soil Biology

Leho Tedersoo

Professor at Tartu University

Soil biogeochemistry

Samuel Abiven

Science director at CEREEP and research professor at ENS, CNRS

Sediments

Raffaele Siano

Researcher at IFREMER

Coastal and offshore waters

Colomban de Vargas

Tara Europa Research Director at CNRS

Shallow waters

Flora Vincent

Group leader at EMBL

Hugo Berthelot

Researcher at IFREMER

Model organisms

Detlev Arendt

Group leader and Senior scientist at EMBL

Chemical profiling

Michael Zimmermann

Group leader at EMBL

Interactive map with TREC national stops 2023/2024

To perform sampling as shown on the map above, TREC works closely with several local partner institutions along the way. Click to open an interactive map showing the national stops of the expedition and TREC activities there.


Coordination team

image of Paola Bertucci

Paola Bertucci

Head of EMBL Scientific Expeditions

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image of Valerie Maier

Valerie Maier

Field Operations Coordinator

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image of Cristian Tambley

Cristian Tambley

Expedition Logistics Manager

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image of Prince Owusu Bonsu

Prince Owusu Bonsu

Visiting Predoctoral Fellow

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image of Stefanie Kandels

Stefanie Kandels

Head of EMBL HD Director Office

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image of Marta Major

Marta Major

Sampling Permits Project Officer

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image of Leslie Pan

Leslie Pan

Field Operations Coordinator

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Field Team

image of Kiley Seitz

Kiley Seitz

Soil Microbiologist

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image of Tina Enders

Tina Enders

Environmental Samples Collection Manager

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image of Anna Mankowski

Anna Mankowski

Postdoctoral Fellow

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image of Lucas Ustick

Lucas Ustick

Postdoctoral Fellow

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image of Anastasiia Grekova

Anastasiia Grekova

Predoctoral Fellow

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image of Adam Oel

Adam Oel

Expedition Field Scientist Animal Models

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image of Antonella Ruggiero

Antonella Ruggiero

Postdoctoral Fellow

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image of Severin Luca Belle

Severin Luca Belle

Expedition Field Scientist

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image of Thomas Haize

Thomas Haize

Expedition Biology Engineer

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image of Jonas Richter

Jonas Richter

Predoctoral Fellow

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image of Kerstin Leberecht

Kerstin Leberecht

Data Manager for ecosystem sampling exp.

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image of Cyril Cros

Cyril Cros

Postdoctoral Fellow

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image of Tobias Gerber

Tobias Gerber

Postdoctoral Fellow

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Data management team

image of Peer Bork

Peer Bork

Director of EMBL Heidelberg

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image of Stephane Pesant

Stephane Pesant

Marine Biocurator

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image of Kerstin Leberecht

Kerstin Leberecht

Data Manager for ecosystem sampling exp.

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image of Matej Trojak

Matej Trojak

Planetary Biology Biocurator

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Former team members

  • Alena Schmeing
  • Christian Marchese
  • Elisa Merz
  • Emily Savage
  • Janelle Flaud
  • Karina Simpertigui

Volunteers (incomplete)

  • Agustina Toscanini (EMBL Hamburg)
  • Andrew McCarthy (EMBL Grenoble)
  • Anton Planchot (ENS)
  • Barbara Ramsak (EMBL Hamburg)
  • Daniele Ancora (EMBL Rome)
  • Daphne Welter (EMBL Heidelberg)
  • Eva-Maria Geissen (EMBL Heidelberg)
  • Federico Clementoni (CCMAR, University of Algarve)
  • Federico Vignale (EMBL Hamburg)
  • Fetemeh Ghaderi (Jena University)
  • Flora Vinvent’s group (EMBL Heidelberg)
  • Gautam Dey’s group (EMBL Heidelberg)
  • Gerald Pfister (EMBL Rome)
  • Hanh Vu’s group (EMBL Heidelberg)
  • Idoia Quintana Urzainqui (EMBL Heidelberg)
  • Irena Provaznikova (EMBL Heidelberg)
  • Jean Watelet
  • Jess Bourn (EMBL Heidelberg)
  • Julie-Maï Paris (ENS)
  • Luca Santangeli (EMBL Heidelberg)
  • Marco Carloni (CNR-Biophysics Institute)
  • Maritxell Mondejar (EMBL Heidelberg)
  • Mathilde Dura (EMBL Rome)
  • Neil Humphreys (EMBL Rome)
  • Pratyasha Biswas (EMBL Heidelberg)
  • Roman Dubreucque (UPSL)
  • Sarah Schulz (EMBL Heidelberg)
  • Sofia Rucli (EMBL Rome)
  • Swetlana Krez (EMBL Heidelberg)
  • Thérèse Rabotin (ENS)
  • Tommy Melzer (Jena University)
  • Vesta Petrasiunaite (EMBL Heidelberg)
  • Victor Secco (Università Ca’ Foscari Venezia)
  • Victoria Witte (EMBL Heidelberg)
  • Yannick Schwab’s team (EMBL Heidelberg)

Acknowledgments

Many thanks to everyone for your dedication and work to make this expedition happen, from our numerous partner institutions and EMBL departments of Accounting, Budget Office, Comms, COO Office, Drivers, Finance, Facility Management, Health and Safety, Human Resources, Imaging Centre, International Relations, IT, Legal, Operations HD, ORD, Photolab, Planetary Biology Transversal Theme, Purchase, Reception, Stores, Strategy, Workshop, and in particular to the people listed below.

  • Federico Clementoni (CCMAR, University of Algarve)
  • Marco Carloni (CNR-Biophysics Institute)
  • Mylene Andre (EMBL-Grenoble Comms)
  • Ivica Letunic (EMBL-Heidelberg)
  • Suvi Turunen (EMBL-Heidelberg)
  • Sinisa Grubesic (EMBL-Heidelberg Accounting)
  • Aleksandra Krolik (EMBL-Heidelberg Comms)
  • Annika Grandison (EMBL-Heidelberg Comms)
  • Holly Joynes (EMBL-Heidelberg Comms)
  • Lisa Vollmar (EMBL-Heidelberg Comms)
  • Rossana De Lorenzi (EMBL-Heidelberg Comms)
  • Tabea Rauscher (EMBL-Heidelberg Comms)
  • Gudrun Lange (EMBL-Heidelberg Driver)
  • Torsten Schiller (EMBL-Heidelberg Driver)
  • Corina Gorny (EMBL-Heidelberg H&S)
  • Joern Krausse (EMBL-Heidelberg H&S))
  • Theodore Selby (EMBL-Heidelberg H&S
  • Anna Steyer (EMBL-Heidelberg Imaging Centre)
  • Georg Wolf (EMBL-Heidelberg Imaging Centre)
  • Olivier Gemin (EMBL-Heidelberg Imaging Centre)
  • Zhengyi Yang (EMBL-Heidelberg Imaging Centre)
  • Dadiana Chiran (EMBL-Heidelberg IR)
  • Hana Jurina (EMBL-Heidelberg IR)
  • Plamena Markova (EMBL-Heidelberg IR)
  • Sarah Kaiser (EMBL-Heidelberg IR)
  • Carmelo Lopez Portilla (EMBL-Heidelberg IT)
  • Erich Schechinger (EMBL-Heidelberg IT)
  • Joaquim Batistsa (EMBL-Heidelberg IT)
  • Antonios Antonopoulos (EMBL-Heidelberg Legal)
  • Silvio Mariani (EMBL-Heidelberg Legal)
  • Joana Witkowski (EMBL-Heidelberg ORD)
  • Mareile Vogler (EMBL-Heidelberg ORD)
  • Andrea Capranico (EMBL-Heidelberg Photolab)
  • Doros Panayi (EMBL-Heidelberg Photolab)
  • Kinga Lubowiecka (EMBL-Heidelberg Photolab)
  • Massimo Del Prete (EMBL-Heidelberg Photolab)
  • Vincenzo Lullo (EMBL-Heidelberg Photolab)
  • Josipa Bilic Zimmermann (EMBL-Heidelberg PB TT)
  • Evelyne Cudraz (EMBL-Heidelberg Purchase)
  • Seyhan Yonka (EMBL-Heidelberg Purchase)
  • Simone Retzbach (EMBL-Heidelberg Purchase)
  • Timm Neff (EMBL-Heidelberg Purchase)
  • Jessica Vamathevan (EMBL-Heidelberg Strategy)
  • Arthur Milberger (EMBL-Heidelberg Workshop)
  • Christian Luell (EMBL-Heidelberg Workshop)
  • Daniel von Paumgartten (EMBL-Heidelberg Workshop)
  • Leo Burger (EMBL-Heidelberg Workshop)
  • Thomas Heinzmann (EMBL-Heidelberg Workshop)
  • Flavio Zizzo (EMBL-Rome)
  • Anton Planchot (ENS)
  • Julie-Maï Paris (ENS)
  • Thérèse Rabotin (ENS)
  • Fetemeh Ghaderi (Jena University)
  • Tommy Melzer (Jena University)
  • Roman Dubreucque (UPSL)
  • Jean Watelet

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