Lichens and air quality: a new citizen science approach

Abstract

Citizen science has been widely adopted in monitoring air quality by indexes of lichen diversity. Since the identification of lichens is challenging, volunteers are often involved in adopting simplified sampling protocols, which require identification at a higher level than the species, or the use of morpho-types, or colors. In Italy, a simple citizen science protocol for monitoring air quality with lichens by involving schools has been successfully tested, and will be replicated at the national level.

Keywords

• anthropic pressure
• biomonitoring
• identification