The DOI matches its Crossref record; 46 of the 46 references it cites were found in a registry or an index.
More than one million barriers fragment Europe’s rivers
Open accessAbstract
Rivers support some of Earth’s richest biodiversity1 and provide essential ecosystem services to society2, but they are often fragmented by barriers to free flow3. In Europe, attempts to quantify river connectivity have been hampered by the absence of a harmonized barrier database. Here we show that there are at least 1.2 million instream barriers in 36 European countries (with a mean density of 0.74 barriers per kilometre), 68 per cent of which are structures less than two metres in height that are often overlooked. Standardized walkover surveys along 2,715 kilometres of stream length for 147 rivers indicate that existing records underestimate barrier numbers by about 61 per cent. The highest barrier densities occur in the heavily modified rivers of central Europe and the lowest barrier densities occur in the most remote, sparsely populated alpine areas. Across Europe, the main predictors of barrier density are agricultural pressure, density of river-road crossings, extent of surface water and elevation. Relatively unfragmented rivers are still found in the Balkans, the Baltic states and parts of Scandinavia and southern Europe, but these require urgent protection from proposed dam developments. Our findings could inform the implementation of the EU Biodiversity Strategy, which aims to reconnect 25,000 kilometres of Europe’s rivers by 2030, but achieving this will require a paradigm shift in river restoration that recognizes the widespread impacts caused by small barriers. Validated barrier inventories and modelling indicate that Europe’s rivers are fragmented by more than one million barriers, such as dams, weirs and fords, causing major impacts on biodiversity.
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Cited by
River ecosystem metabolism and carbon biogeochemistry in a changing world
Battin, T. J., Lauerwald, R., Bernhardt, E. S., Bertuzzo, E., Gener, L. G., Hall, R. O., Hotchkiss, E. R., Maavara, T., Pavelsky, T. M., Ran, L., et al. (2023) · Nature · doi:10.1038/s41586-022-05500-8 · Cited by 594
The type I interferon response in COVID-19: implications for treatment
Lee, J. S., & Shin, E.-C. (2020) · Nature Reviews Immunology · doi:10.1038/s41577-020-00429-3 · Cited by 421
Sun, J., Ding, C., Lucas, M. C., Tao, J., Cheng, H., Chen, J., Li, M., Ding, L., Ji, X., Wang, Y., et al. (2024) · Water Resources Research · doi:10.1029/2022wr034375 · Cited by 30
Self-citationInland navigation and land use interact to impact European freshwater biodiversity
Sexton, A. N., Beisel, J.-N., Staentzel, C., Wolter, C., Tales, E., Belliard, J., Buijse, A. D., Martínez Fernández, V., Wantzen, K. M., Jähnig, S. C., et al. (2024) · Nature Ecology & Evolution · doi:10.1038/s41559-024-02414-8 · Cited by 26
Self-citationSun, J., Baldan, D., Lucas, M. C., Wang, J., Rodeles, A. A., Galib, S. M., Tao, J., Li, M., He, D., & Ding, C. (2025) · Communications Earth & Environment · doi:10.1038/s43247-025-02467-y · Cited by 23
“Whilelargedamsare morelikelytooccurinthemainchannel,otherbarrierslikesmalldams, weirs, and sluice gates are likely to be located in low-order streams and are more likely to be unreported 13,38 .”
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Metadata
- Authors
- Belletti, B., Garcia de Leaniz, C., Jones, J., Bizzi, S., Börger, L., Segura, G., Castelletti, A., van de Bund, W., Aarestrup, K., Barry, J., Belka, K., Berkhuysen, A., Birnie-Gauvin, K., Bussettini, M., Carolli, M., Consuegra, S., Dopico, E., Feierfeil, T., Fernández, S., Fernandez Garrido, P., Garcia-Vazquez, E., Garrido, S., Giannico, G., Gough, P., Jepsen, N., Jones, P. E., Kemp, P., Kerr, J., King, J., Łapińska, M., Lázaro, G., Lucas, M. C., Marcello, L., Martin, P., McGinnity, P., O’Hanley, J., Olivo del Amo, R., Parasiewicz, P., Pusch, M., Rincon, G., Rodriguez, C., Royte, J., Schneider, C. T., Tummers, J. S., Vallesi, S., Vowles, A., Verspoor, E., Wanningen, H., Wantzen, K. M., Wildman, L., & Zalewski, M.
- Venue
- Nature
- Published
- 2020-12-16
- Volume
- 588
- Issue
- 7838
- Pages
- 436-441
- ISSN
- 0028-0836 (ISSN-L)
- 1476-4687
- OpenAlex
- W3112002945
- Cited by
- 709
- References
- 46
- FWCI
- 54.41
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- hybrid
- Licence
- www.springer.com/tdm (tdm)
- www.springer.com/tdm (vor)
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- Belletti, B., Garcia de Leaniz, C., Jones, J., Bizzi, S., Börger, L., Segura, G., Castelletti, A., van de Bund, W., Aarestrup, K., Barry, J., Belka, K., Berkhuysen, A., Birnie-Gauvin, K., Bussettini, M., Carolli, M., Consuegra, S., Dopico, E., Feierfeil, T., Fernández, S., . . . Zalewski, M. (2020). More than one million barriers fragment Europe’s rivers. Nature. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41586-020-3005-2
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