Projects

Biodiversity and ecology of freshwater bacteria The bacterial genus Aquirufa, which was discovered and scientifically described in cooperation with pupils, is the eponym and focus of the research project. The aim is to research the ecology, biodiversity and distribution of Aquirufa in water bodies through the active and creative participation…

This project of the Austrian Alpine Association - a biodiversity monitoring above the timberline - increases our knowledge about alpine animal and plant species, their habitats and about the interrelationships of our actions and the effects on this sensitive living environment. The collected data on the 20 animal and plant…

Participate in archaeological field surveys and/or in cleaning, documenting & interpreting archaeological finds. A transdisciplinary look at the early Neolithic communities in the Schletz settlement cluster The project aims to explore the surroundings of the famous Neolithic settlement of Asparn/Schletz (Lower Austria). Numerous human remains suggest a violent attack on…

Plastic Pirates - Go Europe! A Citizen Science Initiative to investigate plastic pollution along rivers The pollution of beaches and riverbanks in Europe with plastic waste does not stop at borders. Preventing micro- and macroplastics in the environment, addressing this challenge scientifically and researching sustainable materials are therefore tasks we…

Schmetterlinge Österreichs: an app for scientifically recording Austria's butterflies On behalf of Blühendes Österreich, a charitable foundation of REWE International AG and the environmental NGO GLOBAL 2000, butterfly expert Peter Huemer published a report on the dramatic state of the butterfly fauna in May 2016. In Europe, their number had…

We are tracing the Sculptured Resin Bee! Home of the Sculptured Resin Bee (Megachile sculpturalis, Smith 1853) is far away in Japan, China, Korea and Taiwan. In 2008, the Sculptured Resin Bee was discovered in southern France as the first introduced wild bee species in Europe. Since then, the bee…

Since 2006, a wide variety of nature observations can be reported on naturbeobachtung.at. Specially designed reporting masks for various groups of animals, plants and fungi allow detailed entries. The reporters can, as far as possible, identify their observations taxonomically or report them as "undetermined species". The latter can then be…

Democratic Citizenship "Memories and Imaginaries" critically explores with students in Austria what it means to be a citizen. Who can or is allowed to actively participate in the political community? Who can or is not allowed to? We address these questions with the aim of finding collective strategies to confront…

The Pollen Diary was already launched as a scientific project in 2009. Meanwhile it has become an important service for pollen allergy sufferers in 13 European countries: Austria, Germany, Switzerland, France, Great Britain, Sweden, Finland, Croatia, Hungary, Lithuania, Serbia, Slovenia and Turkey. The number of users is growing every year, not…

Be an expert on your disease and join our research! We, the Patient Involvement in Oncology (PATIO) initiative, aim to make the voices of prostate cancer patients and their caregivers heard in medical research. In fact, we know that we currently don’t know enough: patients themselves are the experts that have…

Overview You can tell by its name: The forest dormouse (Dryomys nitedula) is a characteristic species for deciduous and mixed forests. It belongs to the dormouse family and its survival is inextricably linked with forest habitats. The forest dormouse is protected throughout Europe, but data on its distribution is largely…

The golden jackal (Canis aureus) was not considered native in Austria, until the first golden jackal discovery was made in 1987, followed by sporadic records scattered over several federal states and in 2007 the first reproduction record was documented in the National Park "Neusiedler See-Seewinkel". Since then, rumours about camera…

The Austrian start-up Livin Farms develops innovative technologies for the sustainable breeding of insects. Food and other organic residues can be recycled with the help of insects and converted back into valuable proteins. In this way, cycles can be closed and food systems can be made more sustainable. Explorer Challenge…

Important groundwork for bird protection The association BirdLife Austria has been researching and protecting the native avifauna for over 50 years. Citizen science has always been an essential basis of this work, as BirdLife's expertise is based on decades of collecting bird records. In the past, observations were recorded on…

Mapping the distribution of all Austrian breeding birds in the years 2013 to 2018. What is the Breeding bird atlas? The Breeding bird atlas shows the areas of occurrence of all bird species breeding in Austria. It is a central groundwork for bird protection: In addition to the birds’ distributions,…

"Crows in the zoo" is a Citizen Science project of the Department for Behavioral and Cognitive Biology of the University of Vienna in cooperation with the Konrad Lorenz Research Center and the Zoo Vienna. The researchers aim to find out more about the species and subspecies of crows that use the…

Are swallows nesting at your house or in your stable? Have you seen a badger in the middle of town? Or do you regularly observe a kestrel in your garden? We are interested in your observations in rural settlement areas!

Ural owl resettlement The resettlement of the Ural owl is led by a team of researchers headed by ornithologist Richard Zink at the Austrian Ornithological Centre – Seebarn branch office (Lower Austria) at "Vetmeduni" Vienna. The goal is the "Come Back" of the big owl into the forests of Austria.…

The project Pilzdaten-Austria.eu aims at a comprehensive documentation of the occurrence and distribution of fungi in Austria, and to present and evaluate the available data. It is an Austria-wide cooperation of numerous mycologists, citizen scientists and institutions, which collect distribution data of fungi or hold collections of fungal specimens, coordinated…

In this project, citizen scientists can participate in a scientific project to study the breeding behaviour of greylag geese and northern bald ibises. The project is run by scientists of the Konrad Lorenz Research Center (Grünau im Almtal, Upper Austria). Since its foundation in 1973, the Konrad Lorenz Research Center…

Can tea help us understand climate change? Yes, but we need your help! We would like you to become our research partner and take part in one of the largest experiments on soil decomposition processes at the moment!

What is the Zeit.shift project about?  Zeit.Shift is an Interreg project of the Provincial Library Dr. Friedrich Teßmann, the University and Provincial Library Tyrol and the research institute Eurac Research with the aim of computer-linguistically indexing historical newspapers from the Tyrolean region together with Citizen Scientists and publishing them online.…

Participatory exploration of the "Kremser scorpion” (Euscorpius tergestinus) with school students "Triestino scorpion" (Euscorpius tergestinus - still listed as E. carpathicus in the Red List of NÖ), which are threatened with extinction in Lower Austria, exists as an archaeozoon in Krems. This population is an isolated north-eastern outpost of the…

The growing flood of images cannot be processed by institutions alone. Partnership with citizen scientists is vital. Topotheque is a digital archive and network in which this historical legacy can be gathered. For the locally resident Topotheque users, every new image and new piece of information means a valuable building…

You run or participate in a citizen science project? This project could also be listed on Österreich forscht. There are no costs involved. The professional or institutional background of a project is not important. The only requirement is a project description in German, and it must be possible to participate…

The CAMALIOT (Application of Machine Learning Technology for GNSS IoT Data Fusion) project The CAMALIOT project integrates data from the Internet of Things (IoT), including smartphones, and traditional Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS) data sources to leverage Big Data, Data Fusion and Machine Learning technologies to to demonstrate how these data can be used in different scientific…

The Ideenbox (box of ideas) collects the problems of citizens and patients around the topic of health (such as physical and mental health issues, social consequences, care, health prevention...), for which solutions are to be developed with citizens, researchers and other stakeholders. Which health problem do you want research to solve?…

What is this project about? With Picture Pile you can contribute to solving global problems as climate chance and malnutrition by sorting piles of pictures together with other players. How can citizens participate in research? Sorting the pictures is very easy and works in a similar way to other Apps.…

In Viel-Falter: Butterfly Monitoring volunteers, together with researchers from the Department of Ecology of the University of Innsbruck, observe, identify and count butterflies. Given the diverse habitats in Austria, around 210 different species of butterfly live here, considerably more than in the whole of Germany. At the same time, many…

On Geo-Wiki.org you can participate in global environmental monitoring and help to observe and document the earth and what happens on it on a large scale. Whether it is deforestation, the varying size of fields in agriculture or the fast and precise evaluation of hurricane damage - your contribution is…

Project description When it comes to language, everyone can have a say! "IamDiÖ – German in Austria" invites you to explore the diversity, change and use of all possible forms of German in Austria, from dialect and standard language to youth language and jargon. By including the knowledge, opinions, experiences and…

Since April 2021, the University of Vienna has been working on the project BaF - Biodiversity in Cemeteries in cooperation with Friedhöfe Wien (Vienna cemeteries). The aim is to document biodiversity (the occurrence of a wide variety of animal, plant and fungal species) and to investigate the active and passive…

We take care of our meadows and our alpine pastures! Since 2007, farmers from all over Austria have been observing the development of plants and animals on their meadows. The project motto "We take care of our meadows!" stands for the annual counting and documentation of indicator species as well…

An Intergenerational Ethnography on Rural Images of Longing Taking the unique photography collection of the Austrian Museum of Folk Life and Folk Art as its starting point, the research project “Stadt-Land-Kind” (City-Country-Child) investigated the myth of a “better life in the countryside” from an intergenerational perspective. In dialogue with social scientists,…

This project ran from 01.07.2017 to 31.12.2019. You can download a thematic booklet created in the process at the bottom of this page. In addition, print copies can now be made available to school classes free of charge (while stocks last). Please contact the project leaders if you would like…

Interested groups (mainly school classes) can participate in this scientific project about the whereabouts of the greylag geese in the Cumberland game park in Grünau im Almtal (Upper Austria). The social behaviour of the flock of greylag geese of the Konrad Lorenz Research Center (a core facility of the University…

Amphibians and reptiles under observation in Austria Importance and evaluability of databases increase with the extent, the precision and the currency of the data stored. The Natural History Museum Vienna, one of the largest non-university research institutions in Austria, houses more than 30 million objects from the fields of biology,…

The project “GeoMaus” collects information about the distribution of small mammals in Austria, Germany and in Switzerland. Nature enthusiasts are invited to report their observations to learn more about the occurrence of small mammals. Two identification keys (text key and decision tree), information on trace images and on the appearance,…

The “Blick ins Dickicht” project is dedicated to the search for the smallest native dormouse – the hazel dormouse. Until now, only very little has been known about this rare small animal. In order to learn more about its way of life and also how best protect it in working…