The project centered on the European green toad, Bufotes viridis, a pioneer species associated with temporary, often vegetation-free pools and a species categorized as Vulnerable in Austria. The researchers provided 300 standardized polyethylene mini-ponds to citizen scientists across Austria and installed two additional ponds at the Vienna Zoo. Of the 300 distributed to volunteers, 289 were confirmed by photographs to have been set up and were included in the monitoring results.

Each mini-pond measured 120 by 90 by 40 cm, held 150 litres of water and had a surface area of 0.98 m². The team selected the commercially available model with the largest surface-to-volume ratio that met their requirements. Ribbed sides and an attachable coconut-fiber mesh were intended to help animals leave the ponds. Participants were asked not to add soil, gravel, sand, stones, plants or wood, thereby maintaining broadly comparable early-successional, oligotrophic conditions, and to replenish the water regularly.

Pond placement prioritized the known post-2000 distribution of the European green toad in Austria. The researchers used the Austrian Herpetofauna Database, unpublished observations and records from iNaturalist to identify areas, including places associated with populations considered lost, such as Carinthia. Applicants were asked about existing garden ponds and whether amphibians had been observed on their properties, and satellite imagery was used to assess barriers and nearby water bodies. Most ponds were installed and filled during the first week of March 2024.

Monitoring was conducted through the custom AmphiApp smartphone application, which transferred observations to a web-integrated database. Citizen scientists were asked to inspect their ponds every second weekend from 2 March through 1 September 2024 and to report additional observations outside the schedule. Records included the date and time, geographic coordinates, relative water level, whether water had been added, a tentative identification, a description, a photograph and, optionally, an audio recording. The team validated the records and generally treated an observation as associated with a mini-pond when the animal was recorded within five metres, although such cases were rare.

Pelophylax species, which could not be distinguished reliably from photographs or recordings and were therefore treated as one taxon, generated 107 records from 47 ponds and represented 42.3% of all reports. The European green toad produced 59 records from 17 ponds, while the common toad, Bufo bufo, produced 17 records from 14. The smooth newt, Lissotriton vulgaris, was recorded in 12 ponds and the agile frog, Rana dalmatina, in 13. Other observations included the common frog, yellow-bellied toad, fire-bellied toad, European tree frog, alpine newt and crested newt. Reports generally increased during the expected aquatic season, with most made from May through September.

Signs of reproduction—including amplexus, eggs, larvae or metamorphs—were recorded in 29 of the 289 ponds. Evidence of reproduction was reported for eight identified taxa: the smooth newt in six of the 12 ponds where the species was recorded; Pelophylax species in five of 47; the European green toad in three of 17; the common toad in two of 14; the yellow-bellied toad in two of five; and one each for the European tree frog, common frog and alpine newt. The researchers could not confirm reproduction for the agile frog, fire-bellied toad or crested newt. An additional 19 ponds contained reproductive signs that could only be classified as Anura.

To account for the likelihood that amphibians present in a pond went unobserved, the researchers fitted Bayesian single-species occupancy models with the spOccupancy R package. Records were organized into 14 two-week intervals, and only observations within each taxon’s typical reproductive activity period were used. Models were fitted for the smooth newt, European green toad, yellow-bellied toad and Pelophylax species, the four taxa detected in at least 10 intervals. Per-interval detection probabilities were estimated at 0.107, with a 95% Bayesian credible interval of 0.052–0.176, for the European green toad and 0.154, with an interval of 0.062–0.274, for the yellow-bellied toad. Cumulative probabilities over the respective activity periods ranged from 0.658 for the European green toad to 0.836 for the smooth newt. The models found no significant differences among the four species.

These findings provide first-season evidence that small, newly created ponds can attract amphibians and support reproductive activity, but they do not establish the ponds’ long-term effectiveness. The study covered one active season, used fortnightly observations by mostly untrained citizen scientists and could model only four taxa because other species had too few detections across enough intervals. Most volunteers sampled during daylight, which likely reduced detection of nocturnal species, while brief aquatic residency also limited detection of explosive breeders. The authors anticipate that additional species and amphibians may use the ponds during a second season, but that possibility remains a forecast rather than a measured result.

Subject of Research: First-season amphibian colonization and reproduction in Austrian garden mini-ponds monitored through citizen science

Article Title: Early amphibian colonizers of man-made mini-ponds: first results of a citizen science experiment

Article References: Siebert, J., Burgstaller, S., Kornilev, Y. V., Krall, M. M., Hamernik, D., Kremser, J., Loupal, A., Spießberger, M., Zaller, J. G., Schweiger, S., Graf, W., Dörler, D., Heigl, F., & Landler, L. (2025). Early amphibian colonizers of man-made mini-ponds: first results of a citizen science experiment. Herpetozoa, 38, 231-240. https://doi.org/10.3897/herpetozoa.38.e153679

Image Credits: AI Generated

DOI: 10.3897/herpetozoa.38.e153679

Keywords: amphibian conservation, citizen science, garden ponds, European green toad, breeding habitats, occupancy modelling, detection probability, Austria, habitat creation, Early, amphibian, colonizers

The Austrian populations are remnants of a species historically recorded across several eastern Austrian floodplains and wetlands. The Fadenbach population, rediscovered in 1992 after the last Danube-floodplain record in 1975, and the Jesuitenbach population near Moosbrunn are now the only two presumed natural sites in the country. European mudminnow is classified as Vulnerable across Europe and Critically Endangered in Austria.

Researchers sampled the Fadenbach across 15 sections covering 3.3 km in October 2024, when sufficiently high water produced continuous flow, and revisited areas where fish had been detected in August 2025, when the system consisted of isolated pools and sampling was conducted by wading. Electrofishing at the Jesuitenbach was conducted mainly from boats in October 2024 and November 2025. The study also sampled four ex situ populations maintained in garden ponds and at the Vienna Zoo.

Overall, 640 fish were captured, and 191 fin-clip DNA samples were collected between October 2024 and November 2025. Samples included 50 Fadenbach fish, 61 Jesuitenbach fish and 80 fish from the four ex situ populations. Eight microsatellite loci were analyzed, and data of sufficient quality were obtained for 189 samples. The markers had low to moderate polymorphism, with two to 15 alleles per locus across all populations. After correction for multiple testing, no population showed significant deviations from Hardy–Weinberg expectations, linkage disequilibrium between loci, or a significant inbreeding coefficient.

All six populations were significantly differentiated in pairwise comparisons, with the highest FST values consistently involving Jesuitenbach. Bayesian clustering identified two principal groups: Jesuitenbach formed a distinct cluster, while Fadenbach and all four ex situ populations formed another. Excluding Jesuitenbach from the analysis, each captive population was largely distinct, although Fadenbach fish showed assignment to all four ex situ clusters. Principal component and discriminant analyses also separated Jesuitenbach consistently from the other populations.

The linkage-disequilibrium method estimated contemporary effective population size at 36.9 for Fadenbach, with a 95% confidence interval of 24.1 to 77.6. The corresponding Jesuitenbach point estimate was infinite, with a 95% confidence interval of 220.0 to infinity. The researchers cautioned that the infinite estimate reflects a limitation of the method and available marker resolution when effective population size exceeds what can be estimated, rather than evidence of an exceptionally large population. Neither wild population showed significant heterozygote excess in bottleneck testing, so the analysis did not provide evidence of a very recent severe reduction in effective population size.

A comparison with Fadenbach data collected in 2011–2015 found broadly similar neutral diversity about a decade later. Rarefied allelic richness standardized to 20 individuals was 4.25 in the present study, compared with 4.37 previously, while observed heterozygosity was 0.538 and 0.523, respectively, and expected heterozygosity was 0.549 and 0.500. The authors said this apparent stability should not be interpreted as demographic security: neutral genetic measures can respond more slowly than census size to recent or gradual declines, and bottleneck tests have limited power with a modest number of loci and samples.

Field evidence indicates that the Fadenbach population remains in immediate hydrological difficulty. No fish were detected during Habitats Directive monitoring in summer 2023 after extensive desiccation in winter 2022 and spring 2023. Surveys in 2024 and 2025 captured 34 and 47 individuals, respectively, and the 47 fish captured in 2025 were moved to a dedicated conservation pond at the Donau-Auen National Park. Declining groundwater levels have been linked to drainage, intensive agriculture, Danube riverbed incision, and climate-driven changes in precipitation and evapotranspiration. Emergency supplementation with water from Danube side arms may improve connectivity temporarily but can also introduce fish, including pumpkinseed and topmouth gudgeon, and increase sediment inputs.

The four analyzed ex situ stocks all clustered with Fadenbach and were distinct from Jesuitenbach, supporting their documented Fadenbach origin and showing no detectable admixture from another source. They nevertheless differed significantly from one another and from the wild source, consistent with founder effects and subsequent drift. The original numbers were approximately 15–20 fish for pond Wanzenböck, about 12 for pond Engelhartszell, 50 for the Vienna Zoo, and unknown for pond Pekny. The authors recommend integrating individuals from all four lines in future breeding programs to maximize diversity and reduce inbreeding, together with continued genetic monitoring. For the wild populations, they emphasize hydrological restoration, drought refuges, separate management of the genetically distinct units and, for Fadenbach, avoidance of supportive stocking under current conditions. These conclusions are based on neutral microsatellite markers, which cannot assess adaptive diversity or fully resolve functional genetic differences.

Subject of Research: Genetic differentiation and effective population size of Austria’s remaining wild European mudminnow populations

Article Title: Small, isolated, and critically endangered: conservation genetics of the European mudminnow ( Umbra krameri ) in Austria

Article References: Donabaum, R., Jung, M., Ratschan, C., & Koblmüller, S. (2026). Small, isolated, and critically endangered: conservation genetics of the European mudminnow (Umbra krameri) in Austria. Nature Conservation, 65, 115-134. https://doi.org/10.3897/natureconservation.65.188874

Image Credits: AI Generated

DOI: 10.3897/natureconservation.65.188874

Keywords: European mudminnow, Umbra krameri, conservation genetics, microsatellite markers, effective population size, Fadenbach, Jesuitenbach, Austria, floodplain habitats, genetic differentiation, Small, isolated

The Austrian study area in Tyrol comprised seven extensively farmed grasslands and seven ecologically improved sites on formerly intensively managed land. Each improved meadow included a 2-metre-wide flowering strip along one margin. These strips were not seeded; their vegetation developed spontaneously and was mown only once, during the meadow’s second mowing event in August. The Luxembourg study area likewise included seven sites in each category. Its extensively managed grasslands were legally protected lowland hay meadows listed under European Habitats Directive habitat type 6510, while the improved sites were wildflower fallows sown in 2019 or 2020 on formerly intensively farmed land. The fallows received no management during the survey, whereas the protected meadows were cut twice yearly before 15 June or once or twice afterward.

Researchers sampled wild bees from mid-April to mid-July 2021 using white, yellow and blue pan traps. Each site contained three sets of traps, and traps were serviced during eight sampling periods, generally about every 10 days. Specimens were identified morphologically, with DNA barcoding used for selected ambiguous or taxonomically uncertain specimens. The Austrian survey recorded 1,988 wild bees from 117 species in 21 genera. The Luxembourg survey recorded 3,287 wild bees from 105 species in 17 genera. Five of the Luxembourg species—Andrena nigroolivacea, Hylaeus styriacus, Lasioglossum angusticeps, Lasioglossum pauperatum and Seladonia leucahenea—represented first national records. Honeybees were counted but excluded from the wild-bee analyses, and body size was estimated using intertegular distance as a proxy for biomass.

The Austrian comparison produced marked differences between the two management types. The seven extensively farmed grasslands contained 1,484 wild bees, compared with 504 on the seven ecologically improved sites, and their mean species richness was 35.6 species rather than 26.7. Both differences were statistically significant in Wilcoxon rank-sum tests. Estimated biomass did not differ significantly between the Austrian habitat types: the extensive grasslands contained a total of 17,028.97 mg, compared with 13,307.91 mg in the improved sites. Among the regressions testing habitat heterogeneity, only the relationship between wild-bee abundance and ecotone length involving trees, bushes, hedgerows or woods was significant in Austria. This positive relationship explained 40.6% of the variation in abundance after adjustment for multiple comparisons.

Community analyses in Austria also pointed to structural differences among sites. In analyses based on individual abundance, woody ecotones were a significant factor associated with separation between the two habitat types. The same habitat feature was significant when the analysis considered biomass-based composition, below-ground-nesting bees, polylectic species and oligolectic species, while field ecotones were significant for the above-ground-nesting subset. These are associations measured across sites, not experimental estimates of a causal effect. The surveyed Austrian grasslands also contained more above-ground-nesting, polylectic and solitary species than the improved meadows. By contrast, no significant richness difference between habitat types was detected for below-ground nesters, oligolectic species, social species or parasitic species.

Luxembourg showed the opposite arrangement. The wildflower fallows contained 2,045 wild bees, compared with 1,242 in the protected hay meadows, and their mean species richness was 39.3 species per site rather than 29.1. Both differences were statistically significant. Estimated biomass was also significantly greater in the fallows, totaling 34,304.63 mg across the seven sites, compared with 27,277.24 mg in the hay meadows. The improved sites supported more polylectic, solitary, social and below-ground-nesting species, while above-ground-nesting richness was higher by a borderline value of p = 0.050. Differences for oligolectic and parasitic species were not significant. Rank-abundance analysis showed that two highly abundant species, Lasioglossum malachurum and Andrena cineraria, occurred in both Luxembourg habitat types, although the two assemblages also included numerous habitat-specific species.

Floral resources were measured from aerial images obtained during the eight sampling periods. At an altitude of 10 metres, each image covered 385 square metres around the traps, and image pixels were classified as white, yellow or blue flowers. None of the three colour-cover measures was returned as a significant factor in the community-composition analyses. The Luxembourg fallows nevertheless contained selected plants associated with specialised bees, including Hoplitis adunca, which uses viper’s bugloss, and Dasypoda hirtipes, associated with chicory and related plants. The authors noted that unmown stems and plant debris provided nesting and overwintering opportunities for species including Hylaeus, but the study did not quantify the proportion of each Hylaeus species using hollow stems. Open soil, retained vegetation, floral quality and the timing of flowering were also not measured directly.

Landscape structure was evaluated from 20-centimetre-resolution orthophotos within an ellipse of 79,654 square metres around each site’s traps. The investigators counted habitat polygons and calculated ecotone lengths associated with trees, bushes, hedgerows and woods and with other landscape features. In Luxembourg, none of these three heterogeneity measures was significantly related to abundance, species richness or biomass. The authors suggested that unmeasured microenvironmental features, including open soil and the quantity of unmown stems, could have contributed to the observed patterns, but they also emphasized that this remains a hypothesis requiring finer-scale validation. The cross-sectional comparison cannot determine how long the effects of the fallows or reduced-mowing strips will persist or whether the same relationships apply to other landscapes.

The authors interpreted the results as support for combining the protection of stable, extensively managed grasslands with carefully designed improvements on intensively farmed land, rather than treating flower strips or protected meadows as interchangeable. They highlighted the need to account for nesting materials and nesting sites as well as pollen and nectar, and they discussed mosaic or staggered mowing, regionally tailored seed mixtures and species-specific measures as possible approaches. These are management interpretations and recommendations, not interventions tested as treatments in this study. The relatively young Luxembourg fallows had already flowered for several years, whereas the Austrian strips differed from their surrounding meadows chiefly through a less intensive mowing regime. Longer monitoring would therefore be needed to determine how floral abundance, plant richness and bee communities develop over time.

Several sampling limitations constrain the comparison. Pan traps can collect many bee species but may underrepresent large-bodied bees and can be influenced by the abundance and attractiveness of nearby flowers; no Xylocopa were captured, although 75% of Luxembourg’s known Bombus species were recorded. Spatial replication was limited to three trap sets per site, and the mid-April to mid-July period captured mainly spring- and early-summer-flying species while neglecting most late- and autumn-flying bees. Rarefaction analysis indicated similar sampling effort among habitat types but no saturation in the species-richness curves. The authors proposed longer-term monitoring, additional sampling methods such as Malaise or vane traps, direct observations, and more detailed measurements of floral resources, microhabitats, pesticides and forever chemicals. Within these limits, the study shows that bee conservation outcomes differed sharply between two Central European agricultural landscapes, underscoring the need to evaluate restoration measures in their local habitat and management context.

Subject of Research: Comparative assessment of habitat heterogeneity and ecological improvement in Central European agricultural grasslands

Article Title: Wild Bee Conservation: Habitat Heterogeneity and Ecological Improvement in Agricultural Land With Open Grassland

Article References: Lanner, J., Bühler, P., Hellers, L., Kopf, T., Weigand, A., Schlick‐Steiner, B. C., & Steiner, F. M. (2026). Wild Bee Conservation: Habitat Heterogeneity and Ecological Improvement in Agricultural Land With Open Grassland. Ecology and Evolution, 16(10), Article e74514. https://doi.org/10.1002/ece3.74514

Image Credits: AI Generated

DOI: 10.1002/ece3.74514

Keywords: wild bees, habitat heterogeneity, wildflower fallows, grassland conservation, ecotones, agricultural land, Austria, Luxembourg, pollinator ecology, flower strips, Wild, Conservation

The story of these peatlands is, until recently, a story of loss. Over the past century, artificial drainage ditches were cut through the Waldviertel’s acidic bogs so that the land could be used for forestry, agriculture and peat extraction. Draining lowers the water table, halts peat formation, alters soils and vegetation, and reshapes the entire biodiversity of the site. In Austria, the damage has been severe: more than 90 percent of the country’s peatlands have been destroyed. Growing tree cover compounds the problem, because increased transpiration dries out the peat even further, while natural water bodies are converted into linear ditch networks that restructure species composition.

Many of the surviving Waldviertel peatlands now sit inside the Natura 2000 network, the European Union’s system of protected areas, and are gradually being restored. The central technique is disarmingly simple: workers block the drainage ditches with wooden dams. Water backs up behind these barriers, refilling the ditches and flooding the peat pools that dotted the historic bog. From 2017 to 2021, the four study sites—Haslauer Moor, Heidenreichsteiner Moor, Schremser Hochmoor and Schwarzes Moos—were among those included in a cross-border INTERREG restoration project, and earlier efforts by the Worldwide Fund for Nature and LIFE projects had already dammed ditches and cleared central bog areas at some sites. These newly rewetted structures are what ecologists call secondary habitats: not pristine, but potentially valuable substitutes for the natural waters that vanished with the peat.

Whether such artificial waters actually support endangered wildlife has been an open question, particularly for amphibians—animals whose semi-permeable skin and aquatic life stages make them acutely sensitive to water chemistry. Peatland water is notoriously acidic, and laboratory and field studies elsewhere have shown that mortality rises sharply when pH falls below about 4. Yet some species persist in bogs: the Moor Frog’s spawn and larvae are known to tolerate acidic conditions, and Green Frogs use peatlands as summer habitats in North America. The Austrian team set out to determine whether blocked ditches and peat pools in the Waldviertel function as genuine breeding grounds, and to compile a baseline inventory of the region’s herpetofauna, for which data—especially on reptiles—had been scarce.

The fieldwork combined six complementary survey methods for amphibians between April and June 2018: acoustic mapping of calling males, visual searches for spawn, dip-netting for larvae with a fine 2-millimeter mesh, evening torch surveys for newts, baited fish traps set overnight, and opportunistic visual encounters. Reptiles were surveyed from June to mid-August along roughly 400-meter zigzag transects through open moorland, forest edges and the banks of water bodies, during the morning and late-afternoon hours when reptiles bask or forage. The researchers also measured the pH of every water body with a portable meter and mapped twelve distinct microhabitat types—from open moorland with moss to silting peat pools—using orthophotos and GIS software, then ran an indicator species analysis to test whether any animals showed strong habitat preferences.

The results were striking. In total, the team recorded 1,520 amphibians, including larvae and spawn, across eight species: Common Toad, European Tree Frog, Edible and Pool Frogs (grouped as Pelophylax sp., since the two hybridize and cannot be reliably separated in the field), Moor Frog, Agile Frog, Common Frog, Alpine Newt and Smooth Newt. Peat pools proved the busiest waters, holding 725 individuals, with Pelophylax water frogs the most abundant at 416 individuals and Common Toad tadpoles close behind at 250. Blocked ditches hosted 174 individuals across six species, including the tree frog and Alpine Newt. Silting peat pools emerged as the richest microhabitat of all, and Pelophylax frogs were found in nine of the twelve habitat types. Notably, the indicator analysis found no statistically significant habitat specialists, suggesting the animals use these waters opportunistically rather than depending on any single structure.

Perhaps the most remarkable finding came from Schwarzes Moos, the most damaged site, where only one hectare of the original 54-hectare bog survives beside the Czech border. Its water bodies measured a mean pH of just 3.72, with readings as low as 3.2—levels at which many amphibian species cannot survive, since mortality increases when pH drops below 4. In comparable Norwegian studies, successful reproduction was not observed below pH 5.2 for the Moor Frog. Yet at Schwarzes Moos the researchers recorded calling Common Toads, water frogs, Moor Frogs and Common Frogs, and even found Agile Frog spawn. The Moor Frog’s acid tolerance is well documented, but the presence of other species at such extreme acidity hints at local adaptation or at pH fluctuations driven by rainfall that might temporarily open windows for breeding. The authors caution that single-season measurements cannot capture the full chemical variability of bog pools, and they call for year-round abiotic monitoring to untangle the relationship between acidity and amphibian success.

The reptile picture, though sparser, was equally encouraging. Sixty-four individuals of four species were found: the legless Slow Worm, the Grass Snake, the adder (Vipera berus) and the Viviparous Lizard, the latter the most frequently recorded and present at all four sites. Viviparous Lizards, which can submerge for up to twenty minutes to escape predators, were most often spotted between wet moss cushions in open moorland, where they shelter from heat and water loss. Grass Snakes, which feed heavily on frogs, were also found at every site—a direct indication that the restored waters support enough amphibian prey to sustain predators. Most exciting was the adder, listed as vulnerable in Austria and restricted there to montane-alpine regions and the Bohemian Mass. Consistent with its need for quickly warming structures, it was found near dead wood, on moss pads and in tall grass, with all four reptile species co-occurring only at Heidenreichstein.

Five of the fifteen species potentially present in the region are classified as vulnerable, and the study confirms that restoration is delivering habitat for several of them. But the researchers also flag a looming management dilemma. Peat pools and ditches will inevitably silt up through natural succession, and dense tree canopies plus sphagnum growth have been shown elsewhere to depress amphibian breeding, while ditches left untended become poor habitat for brown frogs. Studies in drained peatlands suggest that clearing ditches and removing shrubs can boost colonization, at least in the short term. Since the Natura 2000 management plan aims for a natural climax of moor forest, the authors argue that targeted interventions—maintaining open water and sun-exposed moorland patches—should be weighed carefully in conservation planning.

For a country that has lost nearly all of its peatlands, the message from the Waldviertel is quietly optimistic: even small, artificial, highly acidic water bodies created by restoration can become functioning ecosystems within years of rewetting. As habitat loss, fragmentation, pollution, invasive species, disease and climate change continue to squeeze amphibians and reptiles worldwide, every secondary habitat counts. The wooden dams that hold back water in these Austrian bogs are doing far more than restoring carbon-storing peat—they are building nurseries for toads, frogs, newts, lizards and even adders, one flooded ditch at a time.

Subject of Research: Use of restored peatland water bodies by amphibians and reptiles in Lower Austria

Article Title: Water bodies created by peatland restoration are potential habitats for amphibians and reptiles

Article References: Stückler, S., Sonnleitner, R., & Schweiger, S. (2024). Water bodies created by peatland restoration are potential habitats for amphibians and reptiles. Herpetozoa, 37, 347-358. https://doi.org/10.3897/herpetozoa.37.e130028

Image Credits: AI Generated

DOI: 10.3897/herpetozoa.37.e130028

Keywords: peatland restoration, amphibians, reptiles, Waldviertel, Natura 2000, drainage ditches, peat pools, pH tolerance, Moor Frog, Viviparous Lizard, herpetology, Austria

The scale of the challenge is staggering. Natural history collections document Earth’s biological and geological diversity and serve as essential resources for research on global challenges such as climate change, biodiversity loss, sustainable food production, and ecosystem conservation. Yet despite two decades of rapid growth in digital biodiversity data mobilization, much of the information held in museums and research institutions remains largely inaccessible. Digitization—converting physical specimens and their associated metadata into electronic formats that can be stored, accessed, analyzed, and shared—typically begins with recording metadata, followed by high-resolution imaging of specimens, labels, and documentation. Data are usually gathered under Darwin Core and ABCD standards and made publicly available through platforms like the Global Biodiversity Information Facility (GBIF). But the process is constrained by limited funding, lack of personnel training, restrictive governance structures, and limited technical resources. A major part of the world’s natural science collections is still not digitized at all.

Austria’s holdings are a case in point. The country preserves a unique heritage of over 56 million natural history specimens, some dating back to the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, others comprising modern specimens. In addition to major museums and universities, smaller local museums and even monasteries house biological, paleontological, geological-mineralogical, or archaeological collections. An inventory carried out among the twelve founding OSCA institutions in 2021 revealed that only around 15 million objects—roughly 28 percent—were digitally inventoried, and images were available for fewer than 700,000 objects, about 1 percent. The majority of these objects lack any digital record, making them invisible to both scientists and the public. Several other Austrian collections were not even included in the survey, meaning the true total is higher still.

OSCA’s origins trace back to 2006, when a group of Austrian curators initiated digitization efforts, building on their involvement in publishing biodiversity data through GBIF Austria. A nationwide survey of collections followed, gathering information on specimen numbers, existing digital records, and a preliminary cost estimate for complete digitization. In 2008, twelve institutions established the Austrian Digitization Initiative of Natural Science Collections (ODINS), which aimed to coordinate digitization, apply internationally recognized standards, and raise awareness among funding bodies. Although the goal of financing full digitization was not achieved, collaboration and the exchange of expertise among collection managers continued and intensified. Later, through the Natural History Museum Vienna’s involvement in European networks such as the Consortium of European Taxonomic Facilities (CETAF) and the DiSSCo Prepare project—a preparatory phase for the Distributed System of Scientific Collections Research Infrastructure—regular meetings shared international developments with the Austrian community. These culminated in OSCA’s formation in 2021, initially with twelve founding members, now fourteen.

The consortium’s membership spans the entire country and an enormous disciplinary range. The Natural History Museum Vienna alone houses nearly 30 million objects, from anthropology and botany to geology, mineralogy, paleontology, prehistory, and zoology, available to more than 60 scientists. The Oberösterreichische Landes-Kultur GmbH in Linz holds the second-largest natural history collections in Austria, with thirteen scientists curating more than 15 million objects—including 6.5 million molluscs and 5.5 million insects—and running the ZOBODAT database, which contains over 6.9 million datasets and makes it Austria’s top provider for GBIF. The University of Graz herbarium (GZU) is one of Europe’s most important botanical collections, with approximately 1.2 million specimens and around 10,000 type specimens, including a lichen collection of at least 220,000 specimens of particular international importance. The University of Vienna herbarium houses roughly 1.5 million botanical specimens, while the Tyrolean State Museums hold an estimated 3.5 million specimens, with BioOffice records now exceeding 3 million zoological and 1.7 million botanical datasets.

In 2025, two significant additions strengthened the network. GeoSphere Austria, the national service for geology, geophysics, climatology, and meteorology, joined with one of the country’s most significant geological and paleontological collections—approximately 160,000 entries and an estimated one million individual fossils spanning the Cambrian to the Quaternary, including around 26,000 type specimens. The collection also houses 7,500 mineral samples, 25,000 rock samples, and 441 drill cores representing 16 kilometers of core material, much of it described by prominent Austrian geologists such as Franz von Hauer and Melchior Neumayr. BOKU University joined the same year. The history of GeoSphere’s collection underscores why digitization matters: during World War II, bombing damaged parts of it and buried some specimens, and while volunteers and soldiers saved much of the collection, some items were lost permanently—a reminder that physical scientific knowledge faces real risks.

Technically, OSCA is building a centralized data pipeline designed around the FAIR principles—Findable, Accessible, Interoperable, and Reusable. The cornerstone is the OSCA Data Cache, a PostgreSQL database that will serve as the authoritative repository for aggregated biodiversity information. The system accepts specimen data in Excel format conforming to Darwin Core, along with associated image files. Raw data are parsed, validated against schema requirements, and subjected to quality assurance protocols, while uploaded images are processed through an IIIF (International Image Interoperability Framework) server that extracts metadata to integrate with specimen records. Each record is assigned a persistent identifier (PID) to ensure long-term discoverability and citation. The system exposes a flexible API supporting both REST and GraphQL protocols, enabling efficient data distribution to multiple endpoints—including the OSCA portal, DiSSCo, and Kulturpool—through specialized connectors such as Darwin Core Archives, Open Digital Specimen (openDS), and the Europeana Data Model.

The data flow architecture makes Austrian institutions the DiSSCo node for Austria. Participating institutions supply their data in Darwin Core format to the OSCA Cache, which facilitates regular distribution to both the OSCA portal and DiSSCo, though only records related to preserved specimens are transmitted to the European infrastructure. In parallel, institutions also publish directly to GBIF, and data flow through an existing aggregator at the Oberösterreichische Landes-Kultur GmbH to GBIF Austria and the Biodiversity Atlas Austria. The OSCA portal already enables integrated searches across OSCA data as well as DiSSCo, Europeana, GBIF, and GeoCase, with connectivity to other databases such as DNA sequence records in the Barcode of Life Database (BOLD) through stable links. Artificial intelligence methods are accelerating the process, particularly Handwritten Text Recognition (HTR), which transcribes handwritten historical notes into searchable digital text using tools like Transkribus, making previously inaccessible information available to researchers and the public.

The cooperative model rests on a Memorandum of Understanding signed by all founding institutions in 2022 and extended in 2024. The MoU sets out objectives including establishing a digital inventory and catalogue of Austrian natural science collections, developing them as research infrastructure respecting legal ownership, enhancing their global visibility, implementing standards to improve interoperability, creating 2D and 3D digital images, and linking specimen data with metadata, automated taxonomic and geographic backbones, and research data such as genetic and distribution data. The coordination unit, hosted at the Natural History Museum Vienna and funded by the Federal Ministry for Women, Science and Research with two full-time equivalents for one year and one FTE for an additional four years, leads the consortium’s work. Decisions and information flow take place in weekly meetings attended by technical and scientific representatives, complemented by an annual in-person gathering. A five-year funding period started in 2025, enabling Austria’s participation in DiSSCo and OSCA’s continuation as a national support and coordination structure.

OSCA’s value proposition extends to institutions that have not yet established international data publication workflows, providing a reliable framework to publish digital specimen data with high quality, standardization, and long-term preservation. One of the consortium’s core strengths lies in forming a heterogeneous network—from large federal museums to smaller, specialized collections—across both biological and earth sciences. By providing training workshops, documentation, and technical assistance, OSCA lowers the threshold for participation and fosters a collaborative data culture. Future developments will focus on simplifying data submission, including a user-friendly interface for contributors with limited technical capacity, and streamlining integration with DiSSCo through the OSCA Cache. Even though there is still a long way to go until Austria’s natural science collections are completely digitized and accessible, the readiness of OSCA institutions has increased markedly through knowledge sharing and the construction of a centralized data pipeline. Austria is advancing toward its goal of digitally opening its collections—making them visible, accessible, and usable for interdisciplinary research with significant scientific, societal, and economic relevance.

Subject of Research: Development of the Open Scientific Collections Austria consortium, its 14 member institutions, cooperative model, and FAIR-compliant national data infrastructure for digitizing natural science collections

Article Title: Open Scientific Collections Austria ( OSCA )—from concept to workflows

Article References: Korth, F., Rainer, H., Bara, C.-D., Begic, N., Bses, N., Bilovitz, P., Bräuchler, C., Di Franco, D., Durmaz, A., Eberwein, R. K., Engelberger, S., Festi, D., Friebe, J. G., Götzl, M., Groffman, D., Herburger, A., Kaufmann, P., Kwitt, S., Kustatscher, E., … Vohland, K. (2025). Open Scientific Collections Austria (OSCA)—from concept to workflows. Natural History Collections and Museomics, 2, 1-21. https://doi.org/10.3897/nhcm.2.169440

Image Credits: AI Generated

DOI: 10.3897/nhcm.2.169440

Keywords: OSCA, natural history collections, digitization, FAIR principles, DiSSCo, biodiversity data, Darwin Core, GBIF, persistent identifiers, Austria, Open, Scientific

Relict populations like these are of outsized importance for conservation biology. When climate change or other catastrophic events shrink the range of a widespread species, small refugia can shield remnant populations from extinction. Such pockets often harbor unique genetic information that has been lost elsewhere in the species’ range, and they can serve as sources for future recolonization. For S. cingulata, the northern populations are small in numbers of individuals, occupy only very limited areas, and are considered locally endangered, particularly because of habitat alteration. Understanding their origins is therefore not just an academic exercise but a prerequisite for protecting them.

The new work builds on a discovery that made headlines among Central European naturalists several years ago. The first Austrian population of the giant centipede, in Burgenland near the Hungarian border, was rediscovered and subjected to molecular analysis, which showed that the isolated populations in Romania, Hungary and Austria likely have independent origins. However, that earlier study could not propose a clear hypothesis about where the Austrian animals specifically had come from. Because Austria, despite its small size, has a very large and active community of naturalists and zoologists, the researchers hoped that publishing their initial findings would prompt reports of additional populations of this conspicuous large invertebrate.

That hope was realized. Professor E. Christian of the University of Natural Resources and Life Sciences in Vienna reported a second locality, just five kilometers from the previously described population. The site was visited in 2015 in the company of Dr. Andreas Ranner of the nature and environmental protection office of the Burgenland provincial government, and the presence of the giant centipede was confirmed. Two juvenile specimens were collected under permit and deposited as vouchers at the Zoological Research Museum A. Koenig in Bonn, where their DNA barcodes could be sequenced. Notably, the exact localities of the Austrian populations are not disclosed in the publication, because wild-caught specimens of this long-lived, charismatic invertebrate are commonly offered for sale in the pet trade, and private collectors could severely deplete the small populations.

The second Austrian population lives on an exposed south-facing slope with scattered rocks and shrubs, the same kind of warm microhabitat as the first population. Adults are amber colored with yellow legs and a dark longitudinal dorsal stripe, while juveniles are greyish-blue with an orange head and last tergite, blue legs and a black dorsal stripe. The coloration matches what was described for the first Austrian population. Genetically, however, the two newly sequenced juveniles carried two different haplotypes of the mitochondrial COI gene, differing at 11 positions, or 1.7 percent of the sequence. One haplotype was identical to some found in the first Austrian population, while the second differed from the first population by up to 3.0 percent, immediately signaling that the genetic diversity within Austria was greater than previously appreciated.

To place these new sequences in context, the team assembled a dataset of 31 COI sequences: 29 of S. cingulata from 16 populations spanning France, Croatia, Austria, Hungary, Romania, Greece and Turkey, plus two sequences of the related species Scolopendra canidens as an outgroup. The sequences were aligned with the MUSCLE algorithm, and genetic distances were computed in MEGA X using uncorrected pairwise distances across all codon positions. Phylogenetic relationships were reconstructed under the maximum likelihood criterion in IQ-TREE, with the best-fitting substitution model selected by the Bayesian information criterion and branch support estimated from 1,000 bootstrap replicates. The result was a robust framework for testing competing scenarios about the history of the northern populations.

The phylogenetic analysis delivered a striking result. The Croatian specimen and one haplotype from the second Austrian population fall together with the first Austrian population into a single well-supported clade, and the second, more divergent Austrian haplotype sits at the base of that same Croatian-Austrian group. In other words, the Austrian centipedes are not an isolated oddity but are closely related to the population on the Istrian coast of Croatia, from which they differ by only about 2.0 percent on average. By contrast, the genetic distances to the more eastern populations are much larger: 6.0 percent to Romania and 7.6 percent to Hungary. The Hungarian and Romanian specimens, together with Greek mainland populations and specimens from the Greek islands Koufonisi and Paros, form a separate clade, although that grouping received weaker statistical support.

These patterns point to a clear biogeographic conclusion. The close relationship between the Austrian and Croatian centipedes indicates that the northern-most populations of the species were colonized independently, possibly from separate refugia, after the last glacial period. At least two separate recolonization routes must be hypothesized: one from the west, via Croatia into Austria, and one from the east, via Greece or the Balkans into Hungary and Romania. This dual-route scenario agrees with what has been suggested for multiple groups of insects in the region. The earlier idea proposed by Attems in 1930, that the northern populations arose by gradual speciation along a distance gradient, cannot explain the observed distribution and relationships. The authors caution, however, that denser geographic sampling and population genetic markers with higher resolution will be needed to fully unravel the phylogeographic history of the species in the region.

The study also underscores how much unique genetic information these tiny refugia can contain. Within the first rediscovered Austrian population, genetic distances were low, yet the population carried a haplotype unique within the species. The second locality expands the known Austrian diversity considerably, highlighting the importance of small and fragile populations for the overall genetic diversity of a species. Across the full dataset, the maximum intraspecific genetic distance, 11.9 percent between an Austrian and a French specimen, is consistent with earlier findings of average distances of about 11 percent between clades of S. cingulata in southern Italy, suggesting substantial deep divergence across the species’ Mediterranean range.

Conservation implications follow directly from the genetics. Although no attempts have been made to formally quantify and monitor the Austrian populations, yearly excursion reports by the research team offer worrying hints. Large numbers of adults and sub-adults were observed in 2015 and 2016, but the 2017 report documented an unexpected rarity of the species, and a site visit in 2018 found only juveniles. The populations may therefore be small and subject to fluctuations in size. Given the unique genetic information they harbor, their habitats should be treated as important targets for protection. That argument is reinforced by the company the centipedes keep: the first Austrian population shares its habitat with the only known Austrian population of the centipede Cryptops croaticus and with the endangered ground beetle Carabus hungaricus. Protecting these warm south-facing slopes safeguards not just one charismatic giant centipede but an entire assemblage of thermophilic species clinging to the northern edge of their ranges, living remnants of a post-glacial world whose stories are only now being read from their DNA.

Subject of Research: Phylogeography and post-glacial origins of the northern microrefugial populations of the giant centipede Scolopendra cingulata

Article Title: Origins of the northern microrefugial populations of the giant centipede Scolopendra cingulata Latreille, 1829 revealed ( Chilopoda , Scolopendromorpha , Scolopendridae )

Article References: Oeyen, J. P., Moritz, L., & Wesener, T. (2026). Origins of the northern microrefugial populations of the giant centipede Scolopendra cingulata Latreille, 1829 revealed (Chilopoda, Scolopendromorpha, Scolopendridae). Evolutionary Systematics, 10(2), 275-281. https://doi.org/10.3897/evolsyst.10.205134

Image Credits: AI Generated

DOI: 10.3897/evolsyst.10.205134

Keywords: Scolopendra cingulata, giant centipede, microrefugia, phylogeography, COI barcoding, post-glacial recolonization, Austria, Croatia, Hungary, relict populations, conservation, Evolutionary Systematics

The study set out to answer a deceptively simple question. If digitalisation is supposed to be a lever for implementing the right to inclusive education, as UNESCO’s 2020 report Inclusion and Education: All Means All and the EU’s Digital Education Action Plan both claim, then how have national education systems actually translated that ambition into policy? The researchers focused on students with special educational needs, a group international assessments have repeatedly described as digitally excluded from education and less likely to benefit from digital education policies than their peers. Using a comparative case study design, they examined legislation, national strategies, curriculum frameworks and governmental initiatives published primarily between 2015 and 2025, coding each document against four analytical dimensions: equitable access to digital devices, provision of assistive technologies and adaptive learning tools, development of teachers’ inclusive digital competencies, and support for digital skill acquisition among learners with special educational needs.

The theoretical framework drew on the concept of inclusive digital education, which aims to provide equitable learning opportunities by leveraging technology to support diverse educational needs. In practice, this means accessible digital infrastructures, flexible pedagogical designs, and organisational practices that address learner diversity, from screen readers and text-to-speech software that support students with sensory impairments to structured tablet use that helps students with intellectual disabilities build functional digital competence. The researchers adapted a four-part framework from the field, distinguishing general access to digital devices from access to assistive technologies, retaining digital competence with particular attention to learners with special educational needs, and adding teachers’ inclusive digital competencies because teacher capacity is central to translating digital access into inclusive practice. Absence was treated as analytically relevant too: where digitalisation policies made universal claims without addressing accessibility or learners with special educational needs, the researchers recorded that silence as a finding in its own right.

Austria presents what the authors describe as a paradox. The country has invested heavily in school digitalisation through its Master Plan for Digitalisation and the 8-Point-Plan launched after pandemic school closures exposed shortcomings. The device initiative under the 8-Point-Plan had already reached 95 percent of all students at secondary level I by 2023, and 87 percent of teachers across all school types now report using digital tools. Yet no codified right to assistive technology exists for students who need it. Provision remains legally ambiguous, fragmented across federal, provincial and social insurance bodies, and hampered by outdated equipment catalogues and explicit exclusions of school-related assistive technology from regional funding. Meanwhile, the curricular reform for learners with special educational needs was delayed by two years, and the new special education curricula show lowered and narrowed expectations for digital skills depending on disability type: students with learning difficulties receive reduced complexity and increased scaffolding, while students with intellectual disabilities are expected mainly to achieve supported, functional technology use, communication and participation rather than abstract or independently performed digital competencies.

Croatia tells a different story. The country’s legal framework is among the most explicit in the comparison: the regulation on the education of learners with special educational needs prescribes an individual educational plan for every such learner, and that plan must include recommendations for all accommodations, including information and communication technology. Learners with special educational needs have been included in Croatian mainstream schools for over 40 years, most received a tablet from their school, and they are entitled to assistive technologies according to their needs during their studies. The e-Schools pilot programme, the most significant domestic investment in digital education, distributed over 26,000 digital devices to students and saw mobile support teams visit more than 700 school locations by 2022, with 147 of the 151 pilot schools improving their digital competence by at least one level by 2018. Yet the gap between entitlement and everyday school practice persists. Available assistive technologies sometimes fail to match students’ needs, especially for those with complex educational requirements, forcing institutions and non-governmental organisations to apply for project-based funding such as the ATTEND project, which equipped 34 schools with assistive technology between 2021 and 2024.

The Croatian case also exposes a teacher-competence deficit. Although both special and mainstream teachers take compulsory courses on assistive technology during their master’s studies, only 31 percent of surveyed teachers apply universal design for learning principles in teaching activities, and only 28 percent use and promote assistive technology in daily instruction of learners with complex communication needs. Schools in rural areas still lack essential infrastructure for digital education, and the heavy dependency on EU funding introduces structural fragility into reforms whose long-term sustainability has not been secured. More recent developments signal greater ambition: the Whole-Day School reform, piloted in 62 schools from the 2023/2024 school year, made information and digital competences a mandatory subject across all primary grades, and the BrAIn project launched in 2023 aims to develop AI-based curricula and personalised learning recommendation systems. Whether these reforms close the implementation gap remains an open question.

Iceland operates under a third governance logic. Its universalist inclusion model frames inclusive education as a principle governing the organisation of the education system as a whole, rather than a separate form of provision for particular groups. A single national curriculum framework applies across compulsory schooling, digital competence is located within a broader conception of literacy, participation and critical engagement, and no separate digital learning goals exist for students with disabilities. Differentiation is expected to take place through individualised planning, adapted materials and support within the common framework. Assistive technology provision is distributed across sectors: national health insurance contributes to necessary assistive devices under the Health Insurance Act, specialist services such as the National Institute for the Blind, Visually Impaired and Deafblind advise schools and assess accessibility, and municipalities run their own tablet and one-to-one device initiatives. Research from Kópavogur indicates that tablet use can support multimodal learning, alternative forms of communication and student agency. But the decentralised structure creates substantial variation across municipalities, and the researchers found limited national guidance on accessibility, assistive technology or differentiated digital pedagogy.

Across all three countries, teacher education emerges as a weak link, though in different ways. Austria’s new primary teacher education curricula, implemented in the 2025/2026 school year, position digitalisation and inclusion as cross-cutting themes, but operationalisation varies starkly across institutions: one curriculum embeds the intersection across multiple modules including assistive technologies and AI-supported differentiation, while others reduce it to a single low-credit course or mere thematic proximity. The DigiKomp framework promotes digital diagnostic proficiency and individualised learning support as core competencies, yet other categories address inclusive practice only peripherally. Iceland’s teacher education programmes clearly represent both inclusion and digital competence, but often as parallel rather than integrated domains, and the country lacks a national teacher-competence framework explicitly defining inclusive digital education. Croatia’s training falls short of the competency demands implied by its own legal frameworks, particularly the obligation to develop ICT-integrated individual education plans.

The comparison’s most striking finding concerns the fourth dimension: digital skill acquisition for learners with special educational needs. Formal recognition of digital competence is increasingly widespread, but its link to inclusive pedagogy and equitable expectations remains uneven. Austria’s delayed and narrowed special education curricula contrast with Croatia’s genuine curricular commitment, while Iceland’s shared entitlement leaves the articulation of how supports connect to digital competence development largely to practice. The authors also note that empirical evidence on implementation varies across the three countries in date, scope and methodology, that special educational needs does not represent an equivalent legal or educational category across the systems, and that the findings support analytical rather than statistical generalisation.

The study’s conclusion is sobering for policymakers who equate digitalisation with inclusion. All three countries have invested substantially in infrastructure, yet inclusive digital education requires more than devices and connectivity. Sustainable progress, the researchers argue, depends on governance-sensitive frameworks connecting digitalisation, accessibility, teacher education, assistive technology and learner participation. The three cases represent distinct governance logics, federal-fragmented in Austria, centralised-aspirational in Croatia, and decentralised-universalist in Iceland, but each produced different domains of weakness, suggesting that policy-transfer approaches assuming context-neutrality will not work. The authors propose that an explicit inclusive digital education plan, connecting all relevant policy areas, might help avoid a digital divide between students and those labelled as having special educational needs, and they call for future research spanning more European countries, dedicated assistive-technology implementation studies, and evidence foregrounding student perspectives, especially for learners with complex support needs.

Subject of Research: Inclusive digital education policies for learners with special educational needs in Austria, Croatia and Iceland

Article Title: Inclusive digital education policies in three European countries: a comparative analysis

Article References: Buchner, T., Alimović, S., Hreinsdóttir, A. M., & Kjartansdóttir, S. H. (2026). Inclusive digital education policies in three European countries: a comparative analysis. Frontiers in Education, 11, Article 1919297. https://doi.org/10.3389/feduc.2026.1919297

Image Credits: AI Generated

DOI: 10.3389/feduc.2026.1919297

Keywords: inclusive digital education, digital education policy, special educational needs, assistive technology, comparative education, Austria, Croatia, Iceland, teacher digital competencies, digital divide, curriculum reform, European Union

The fossils come from the late Sarmatian Central Paratethys stage, corresponding to the late Serravallian of the global timescale, and were collected in the early 1900s from the clay pit behind the Wolf brickyard, founded in 1870 by Johann Guido Wolf. Clay was excavated there until the 1960s, and brick production finally ceased in 2001. The former mining area has since been converted into a residential neighbourhood, but the plant impressions, now housed in the Universalmuseum Joanneum in Graz and the Natural History Museum Vienna, survive as a snapshot of the vegetation that thrived along the eastern margin of the Alps during a pivotal moment in Earth’s climate history.

The assemblage is dominated by plants of swamp and riparian habitats. Among the most abundant are narrow-leaved willows of the fossil-species Salix varians, sweet bayberry of Myrica lignitum, and the distinctive oblique, asymmetrical leaves of Byttneriophyllum tiliifolium, a member of the mallow family whose maple-like winged fruits were long mistaken for Acer. Elm leaves of Ulmus carpinoides, plane-tree leaves of Platanus leucophylla, and the palmately lobed leaves of Liquidambar europaea round out the riparian picture. Aquatic and wetland herbs are represented by pondweed of Potamogeton stiriacus, cattail of Typha latissima, reed of Phragmites oeningensis, and the giant parallel-veined leaves of Zingiberites borealis, a monocot of uncertain affinity within the ginger order. Horsetail rhizomes bearing whorled tubers of Equisetum complete the wetland inventory.

Crucially, the flora also contains a handful of taxa that almost certainly grew at some distance from the lake, on well-drained lowland and upland soils. These include the small, densely veined leaves of Buxus, the toothed leaflets of Rosa, the elliptical leaves of Fagus haidingeri, the birch-like Betula similis, and the trilobed maple Acer jurenakii. A single moss fragment resembling the modern genus Rhizomnium, a typical element of contemporary beech forests around Graz, reinforces the inference that mesic forest existed in the hinterland. Together with carpological remains from the roughly coeval Gratkorn clay pit just 7.6 kilometres to the northwest, which yielded Nigella, Celtis, and Polygonum, these taxa sketch a landscape of varied vegetation types with vertical zonation, possibly linked to tectonic uplift of the Eastern Alps during this interval.

To characterise the climate, the researchers constructed Köppen profiles for selected fossil-taxa by mapping the modern geographic ranges of their closest living analogues onto the Köppen-Geiger climate classification. For the maple Acer tricuspidatum, a member of the red maple section, the combined profile of three extant East Asian and North American species was used. For Fagus haidingeri, all western Eurasian beech species plus East Asian members of the subgenus were pooled. For Buxus, the modern Buxus sempervirens served as analogue, and for Nigella the entire genus of sixteen species was employed. The resulting profiles show that temperate elements such as Acer section Rubra and Fagus predominantly occupy fully humid Cf and Df climates, while Buxus extends into Mediterranean summer-dry Cs climates, and Nigella shows a clear preference for Mediterranean conditions, consistent with locally drier plant communities on edaphically dry soils.

Coexistence intervals reconstructed from the macroflora of Andritz, using the climate preferences of nineteen fossil-taxa covered by the modern analogue dataset, suggest a mean annual temperature of 14.4 to 15.8 degrees Celsius, a coldest month mean temperature of 2.2 to 6.8 degrees Celsius, and a mean annual precipitation of 843 to 1,179 millimetres. These values align closely with climate parameters previously inferred for several Sarmatian floras in Hungary, which yielded mean annual temperatures of roughly 14 to 16.6 degrees Celsius and precipitation of about 759 to 1,179 millimetres. When the Hungarian values are matched against a global database of more than 2,600 modern climate stations, the closest analogues are fully humid temperate climates of the Cfa type found today in Japan and eastern North America, with a smaller share corresponding to summer-dry Csa climates of France, Italy, and Turkey, and winter-dry Cwa monsoon climates.

The combined evidence points to a temperate climate with both temperature and precipitation seasonality but without severe drought periods. This conclusion contradicts earlier suggestions of arid or savannah-like conditions during the Sarmatian. Berger and Zabusch, writing in 1953 about the Türkenschanze flora of Vienna, had proposed a dry phase and even invoked African savannah, but the new analysis shows that climates occurring today in East African savannah regions differ profoundly from those inferred for the Sarmatian of Europe by their much warmer mean annual temperatures and their almost rainless winters. Similarly, an earlier inference of semi-arid conditions at Gratkorn based on ectothermic vertebrates, suggesting precipitation of 486 plus or minus 252 millimetres, appears to fall at or below the lower limit of the most likely values, given that the minimum annual rainfall for the modern beech Fagus sylvatica, the most common broadleaved forest tree in Austria, is 500 millimetres.

Beyond climate, the flora reveals striking biogeographic patterns. Acer jurenakii, the most abundant maple in the Andritz assemblage, was an endemic element of the Pannonian Basin during the late Neogene, recorded from eastern Austria, Hungary, southern Poland, and western Ukraine, with a stratigraphic range from the Sarmatian into the Early Pliocene. The genus Acer appears to have been species-rich in the European Neogene, with several endemic fossil-species; the roughly coeval flora of Bánhorváti in northern Hungary alone yielded four endemic maples, and three more were described from the Pliocene of Frankfurt. Zingiberites, the enigmatic monocot, shows a similarly restricted distribution, occurring in the Andritz flora and in the roughly coeval flora of Felsőtárkány in northern Hungary. This pattern of regional endemism among temperate elements such as Acer and Berberis appears characteristic of the Neogene of Central Europe.

In contrast, the Byttneriophyllum/Banisteriaecarpum plant tells a story of relictualism. This extinct member of the mallow family, whose leaf and fruit genera almost certainly belonged to a single biological species, has a fossil record spanning all of Eurasia from the late Eocene or early Oligocene to the Pliocene. Recent discoveries of fossil wood, foliage, and winged mericarps attached to a peduncle with five attachment scars suggest affinities with the tropical African genus Triplochiton in the subfamily Sterculioideae, while fruit morphology also resembles Heritiera in the Helicterioideae. Because the characters are intermediary and the leaves are distinct, the researchers propose that Byttneriophyllum/Banisteriaecarpum represents an extinct subfamily of Malvaceae. The lineage appears to have radiated between western North America and Northeast Asia during the early to middle Eocene, migrated to Central Asia by the late Eocene, and expanded into Europe during the Miocene, reaching as far as Denmark, Iceland, and southern Greece. It did not survive beyond the Pliocene, possibly related to the reduction of wetland plant communities.

The flora of Graz-Andritz, though only moderately rich, proves remarkably informative. Because leaf fossils allow taxonomic resolution below the genus level, they can be used to trace the geographic and stratigraphic presence of individual species and to compare them with modern counterparts. Combined with the pollen and spore record from Gratkorn, which captures both local and regional vegetation, and with carpological remains from the same site, the Andritz macroflora strongly suggests that the climate of the Styrian Basin during the late Sarmatian was temperate with seasonality in both temperature and precipitation but without a pronounced dry period. This reconstruction conforms with palaeoclimates previously inferred for the Vienna and Pannonian basins and resolves a long-standing debate about whether the Sarmatian of Central Europe was arid, subhumid, or humid. The answer, it turns out, was none of the extremes: a seasonal temperate world where swamp forests, riparian woodlands, and well-drained beech and maple forests coexisted around a shallow lake, sheltering endemic lineages alongside relicts that had travelled across half of Eurasia before finally disappearing forever.

Subject of Research: Palaeobotany

Article Title: The late Middle Miocene (late Sarmatian) flora of Graz-Andritz (Austria): Environmental, climatic, and biogeographic patterns

Article References: Denk, T., Bouchal, J. M., Dirr, L., Nickel, S., & Gross, M. (2026). The late Middle Miocene (late Sarmatian) flora of Graz-Andritz (Austria): Environmental, climatic, and biogeographic patterns. Fossil Record, 29(1), 333-372. https://doi.org/10.3897/fr.29.187793

Image Credits: AI Generated

DOI: 10.3897/fr.29.187793

Keywords: Miocene, palaeobotany, Austria, Graz, Sarmatian, fossil flora, palaeoclimate, biogeography, Central Paratethys, endemism, late, Middle

The research team, led by Laura Plotho and Nicole Posch of the Institute of General Practice and Evidence-Based Health Services Research at the Medical University of Graz, surveyed patients during routine care in September 2025 using a self-administered questionnaire. Participants were asked, in binary items, whether they intended to use telephone-based telemedicine more often and whether they intended to use video-based telemedicine more often. The researchers then ran separate binary logistic regression models for each modality, with gender, age, educational attainment and degree of urbanization as predictors.

The headline finding is a steep age gradient. For telephone consultations, compared with patients aged 18 to 29, the odds of intending to use the service more often fell progressively with each older age band. Patients aged 45 to 59 had roughly 40 percent lower odds, with an odds ratio of 0.599 and a 95 percent confidence interval of 0.414 to 0.868. Among those aged 60 to 74 the odds ratio dropped to 0.244, and among patients aged 75 and older it collapsed to 0.101, meaning the oldest group had about one-tenth the odds of the youngest adults. The pattern for video consultations was similar, though somewhat less pronounced in the middle age bands: patients aged 60 to 74 showed an odds ratio of 0.435, and those 75 and older an odds ratio of 0.128, both statistically significant.

Gender mattered for one modality but not the other. Men had lower odds than women of intending to use telephone consultations more often, with an odds ratio of 0.699 and a confidence interval of 0.545 to 0.898. For video consultations, however, no comparable gender difference emerged in the reported results. This asymmetry is one of the study’s most interesting technical observations, because it suggests that the barriers and appeal of the two modalities are not simply two flavors of the same digital phenomenon.

Instead, education and geography split the picture further. Higher educational attainment and residence in densely populated areas were both associated with greater intention to use video consultations, with p-values below .001 and .009 respectively. Neither of these factors showed the same association for telephone consultations in the reported findings. The authors interpret this as evidence that video-based telemedicine carries stronger sociodemographic gradients, potentially because it demands more from patients: a stable internet connection, suitable devices, digital literacy and a private space for a camera-mediated conversation. Telephone consultations, by contrast, rely on infrastructure nearly everyone already possesses.

The statistical architecture of the study is straightforward but well suited to the question. Binary logistic regression estimates the odds of a yes-or-no outcome as a function of predictors, and the odds ratios reported here quantify how much the odds of wanting more telemedicine multiply or shrink as one moves between categories, for instance from the youngest to the oldest age group. Confidence intervals that exclude 1.0 indicate associations unlikely to be due to chance at the conventional threshold. The overall p-values for age, below .001 in both models, signal that the gradient is not a quirk of any single comparison but a consistent trend across the whole age distribution.

What makes these numbers consequential is the population they come from. Primary care is the front door of most health systems, and in Austria, as elsewhere, family practices serve a broad cross-section of society, including many older patients with chronic conditions who are among the most frequent users of medical services. If the patients most likely to need frequent contact with their practice are also the least inclined to shift that contact to the telephone or a video screen, then health systems that push telemedicine as a one-size-fits-all efficiency measure may misread their own demand curves.

The study also fills a genuine evidence gap. The authors note that modality-specific determinants from the patient perspective remain limited, particularly in Austria, where telemedicine regulation and reimbursement have evolved along a distinctive path. By measuring telephone and video uptake intentions separately rather than collapsing them into a single digital-willingness construct, the survey captures a distinction that matters for planning: a practice can reasonably offer phone follow-ups to nearly all patients, but video consultations may concentrate among younger, better-educated urban patients unless additional support is provided.

The practical implication the authors draw is a case for hybrid care models that combine in-person, telephone and video consultations according to patient preferences, digital readiness and clinical context. Such models would treat telemedicine as one channel among several rather than a replacement for the consulting room. For older patients, telephone consultations may serve as a low-threshold entry point into remote care, while video may suit younger patients managing routine issues around work schedules. For rural patients, whose intention to use video was lower than that of their urban counterparts, infrastructure and training may be as decisive as attitude.

The survey was funded by the Styrian Health Fund, which had no role in study design, data collection, analysis or publication, and received ethical approval from the ethics committee of the Medical University of Graz. Data were collected anonymously with informed consent obtained implicitly when patients chose to complete the questionnaire after being informed of the study’s purpose. As the authors themselves frame it, the future of primary care is unlikely to be fully digital or fully face-to-face, but a carefully calibrated mix, one that respects the fact that a 78-year-old and a 25-year-old may want very different things from the same practice, offers the most realistic path to care that is both efficient and equitable.

Subject of Research: Sociodemographic determinants of patient intention to use telephone- and video-based telemedicine in Austrian primary care

Article Title: Determinants of telephone- and video-based telemedicine uptake in primary care: a cross-sectional survey

Article References: Plotho, L., Berger, N., Petschk, K., Radl-Karimi, C., Spary-Kainz, U., Siebenhofer, A., & Posch, N. (2026). Determinants of telephone- and video-based telemedicine uptake in primary care: a cross-sectional survey. BMC Health Services Research. https://doi.org/10.1186/s12913-026-15868-2

Image Credits: AI Generated

DOI: 10.1186/s12913-026-15868-2

Keywords: telemedicine, primary care, telephone consultation, video consultation, digital health, cross-sectional survey, Austria, sociodemographic predictors, health services research, aging population, patient perspective, hybrid care models

The stakes are high because the independent sector has become indispensable to Austria’s cultural life. Emerging from the cultural democracy movements of the 1980s and sustained by public funding, small and mid-sized non-profit organisations specialised in contemporary, discursive and participatory formats that the major institutions and folklore circuits rarely produce. Yet the sector’s cultural relevance has always coexisted with economic fragility. The dominant funding logic distributes support through project grants, often described as the watering can principle, spreading resources thinly across many applicants. That model conditions bogus self-employment, unstable incomes, hybrid professional roles and multiple jobholding, which have hardened into defining characteristics of the sector rather than occasional exceptions.

The consequences compound over a lifetime. Austria introduced artists’ social insurance in 1983 and mandatory coverage for the so-called new self-employed in 1998, but that scheme covers health, accident and pension contributions while excluding unemployment insurance and continued payments during illness. Multiple and seasonal employment frequently triggers double contributions without accumulating benefits, and low pensions leave the sector’s pioneering generation facing poverty in old age. The 2010 Theatre Employment Act promised improvement, but its implementation in the independent scene remained partial because of double insurance burdens, limited budgets and high ancillary wage costs. Interest groups have advocated fair pay for three decades, and the new study treats their persistence as evidence that the problem is structural, not behavioural.

The reform itself unfolded in stages. Fair pay entered the 2019 government agreement, and the COVID-19 pandemic, which exposed the sector’s lack of reserves, acted as a catalyst. In 2020 the Federal Ministry launched the Fairness Process with sectoral interest groups, grounded in collaborative governance and articulated through a Fairness Code and the principle of voluntary commitment. A nationwide survey of the fair pay gap followed in 2021, and in 2022 the federal authorities adopted a Fair Pay Strategy that acknowledges shared responsibility across federal, state and municipal levels. Between the 2022 pilot phase and 2024, the earmarked support programme grew from 6.5 million euros to 10 million euros, signalling incremental fiscal consolidation even as the broader framework remained non-mandatory.

The core instrument is technically elegant. It consists of an earmarked support programme, open to artists and cultural organisations alongside traditional funding, in which applicants submit standardised data forms documenting the gap between actual and fair remuneration so that the difference can be covered. To operationalise fair pay in an unregulated and highly diverse working environment, interest groups produced discipline- and profession-specific salary schemes for employees and fee guidelines for freelance work, which funding authorities disseminate as normative reference points. The deliberate choice of the term fee guidelines rather than fee schedules is designed to deflect potential accusations of anti-competitive agreements in occupational fields classified as liberal trades, a legal tension that European research and advocacy have long flagged.

The Austrian model contrasts sharply with the Dutch benchmark that the authors use for comparison. The Netherlands makes fair pay mandatory for organisations in covered sub-sectors and for municipalities as subsidy providers, and it rests on a collective agreement. Austria’s approach relies on voluntary commitment, which the study identifies as a decisive weakness. Fragmented governance and non-binding measures prevent the gap from closing uniformly: implementation varies in commitment, timing and fiscal contribution across Austria’s federal layers, producing asynchronous rollout, incomplete gap closure through uneven co-financing and limited participation in rural municipalities, where remuneration gaps are often highest. Obliging municipal mandates, the authors argue, would reduce precisely these disparities.

Politics intrudes as well. Because cultural affairs fall to the state governments, the right-wing FPÖ in one Austrian state has opposed implementing Fair Pay on the grounds that folklore should take priority in grant-making. The study notes that this position disregards the distinct paradigms of voluntary engagement in collective cultural practices versus professional cultural labour, as well as Austria’s ratification in 2006 of the UNESCO Convention on the Diversity of Cultural Expressions. The episode illustrates how fair pay reform, even when fiscally modest, becomes entangled with contested visions of what public cultural funding is for.

Measurement problems compound the governance ones. Austria’s cultural statistics do not systematically differentiate between public and private non-profit employment structures, nor do they comprehensively register independent initiatives, leaving the sector unclassified, underexplored and only partially visible. Those gaps contaminated the Fair Pay Gap survey itself: missing population data and biased sampling led to misrepresentation, so the survey captures only large-scale trends in pay disparities while the policy operates on an incomplete empirical infrastructure. The authors argue that understanding a hybrid labour market characterised by precarious conditions requires comprehensive data collection and transparency about the realities of cultural work, without which reform cannot be calibrated or evaluated.

Perhaps the deepest constraint is that cultural funding, labour law and welfare policy operate as an interconnected system. Recent restrictions on supplementary earnings during unemployment disproportionately hit the arts and culture sector, where multiple jobholding and hybrid roles are structurally embedded, and may undermine both cultural sustainability and the efficiency of public expenditure. Meanwhile, a sector-wide shift away from project-based funding toward genuine employment would require expanding employment law and significantly increasing cultural budgets, to an extent the authors describe as currently unrealistic; multi-year subsidy agreements were even temporarily suspended under national austerity measures. Alternative pathways, such as collaborative sectoral organisation and cross-sector partnerships developed jointly with the field, might reduce systemic dependence on project grants while preserving diversity in programming.

The lessons the authors draw reach well beyond Austria. They call for harmonised standards across territorial authorities, mandatory municipal fair pay requirements on the Dutch model, adequate statistical visibility for the independent sector, and stronger interest-group representation, which in Austria has been critical to building the sector for decades even while the interest groups themselves face a high pay gap. At the transnational level, they point to a European status for artists and cultural professionals to standardise employment protections, public goods principles that recognise cultural labour markets as distinct, cultural awareness clauses in other policy domains, and the push to include culture among the Sustainable Development Goals. Narrative framing matters too: social impact analysis, refined since J. M. Schindler’s pioneering 2012 proposal, can generate credible evidence of the societal contribution of arts and culture, and reframing public cultural expenditure as societal investment rather than subsidy could secure more durable political support. For now, Austria’s higher incomes and preserved diversity of offerings look like genuine progress, but the study’s central message is that fair pay is not an income correction. It is a systemic transformation, and it succeeds only when fiscal commitment is matched by governance coordination, good data, cross-domain awareness and enforceable European frameworks.

Subject of Research: Fair pay policy implementation and precarity in Austria's independent arts and culture sector

Article Title: Doing fair pay. Implications from the Austrian experience

Article References: Teissl, V., & Unnold, Y. (2026). Doing fair pay. Implications from the Austrian experience. European Journal of Cultural Management and Policy, 16, Article 16458. https://doi.org/10.3389/ejcmp.2026.16458

Image Credits: AI Generated

DOI: 10.3389/ejcmp.2026.16458

Keywords: fair pay, cultural policy, Austria, independent arts sector, precarity, artists' status, cultural funding, social protection, interest groups, UNESCO, European cultural policy, non-profit cultural organisations