Floating research platform to test changes in Lake Geneva

Swiss researchers have set up an innovative floating platform in Lake Geneva to test environmental changes, despite opposition from local inhabitants in Pully, near Lausanne.  On board are “countless radiosondes and sensors which should enable reserachers […] to gain a better understanding of the ecological processes at work in Lake Geneva as well as the interactions between the water and the atmosphere”, says a press release from the Swiss Federal Institute of Aquatic Science and Technology, EAWAG.  The platform, dubbed “LéXPLORE”, is a joint project between EAWAG, the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology Lausanne (EPFL) and the Universities of Geneva and Lausanne.    Lakes can serve as “sensitive early warning signals for environmental change,” says aquatic physicist and EAWAG director Johny Wüest.  + Read about plastic pollution in Lake Geneva The research station is to operate near Pully in Switzerland’s western Vaud canton until 2026, “revealing hourly, seasonal and ...