Alpine Critical Zone Observations at the Gran Paradiso National Park, Italy

 In high mountain, the Critical Zone (CZ) is undergoing rapid modifications, mainly owing to climate and land-use change. Since 2017, we established a 'diffuse' observatory in the Gran Paradiso National Park (Italy) to study Alpine CZ dynamics, focusing in particular on carbon and water fluxes. The observatory includes three monitoring sites (ranging from 1500 m a.l.s. to 2700 m a.s.l) located in different valleys, where specific research activities and open-air experiments are ongoing. These analyze the role of the climatic and environmental drivers of the carbon and water fluxes and study the effects of i) different geological environments, ii) water regimes, and iii) grazing pressures. In addition, we compare different sampling methods such as eddy covariance, portable and automated accumulation chambers. This chapter provides an overview of the characteristics of the Alpine environment, the ongoing changes, and the results and future perspectives of the 'diffuse' observatory at Gran Paradiso.